Apres-BARGE trip report
Well, for what was a very quick and impulsive jaunt over to Vegas, I feel like I packed in a lot of excitement. I left Vancouver on Saturday evening. My flight to LAX got delayed due to lightning in Calgary (where the plane came from) and thus took off and arrived an hour late in LAX. I missed my connection to LAS (which was the last flight of the night to Vegas) and thus missed all the reindeer games. I called up Laren, who lives just a few minutes from LAX, and crashed at her apartment for a couple hours before getting up for the 6am flight out to Vegas.
I arrived at the Golden Nugget around 8am and slept a couple more hours on Spencer's spare bed. After getting up around noon I wandered over to Binion's to see who might be around. Apparently there was some super-satellite to a tournament at the Playboy Mansion, so there were a lot of the standard jokes about why I wasn't playing in the tournament. For the record, (although I'm sure everyone knows this) I obviously have nothing against the Playboy Mansion itself. It's an interesting little tourist trap and people should go if they get the opportunity.
Without any real plans until dinner at 6:30, I decided to phone up the Bellagio to find out what cash games they had going on. I was shocked and horrified by the response -- I was told the biggest game they had going there was 10/20 NL. I asked about limit games and they said all they had was an interest list for 60/120 ... and it had only two names on the list. I texted this to Gavin and he tried to convince me to come out to LA, where apparently the previous night there had been 400/800 limit hold'em, 300/600 razz and 200/400/50 NL 2-7. I suppose the Legends just moved all the action from Vegas to LA.
We -- by which I mean about 14 BARGErs -- had dinner at Rosemary's, which I'm sure I've raved about in the past. It's just a fantastic restaurant and arguably the best value in the city for a nice meal. Also, the waitress remembered me from when Hoss, Kenny and I ate there earlier in the WSOP and quite obviously thinks I'm cute.
On Wednesday, Kenny and I met up with Bree Goldman to go to lunch at Lotus of Siam. Apparently during lunch Lotus offers a buffet in addition to their usual a la carte menu. IMO the buffet isn't really as spectacular as their usual fare, but the price is right at like $10/person. I ate a lot and went back to the room and passed out until dinner, which was at, coincidentally enough, the Goldman's house. I am always treated like family by Dan and Sharon and they also invited all the remaining BARGErs, which ended up totaling a solid 20 people there. Among the people there were Richard "Quiet Lion" Brodie and his girlfriend Diane. I started talking with Diane and was amazed to learn that she had taken private lessons with Ryron and Rener Gracie for 12 years. This was pretty shocking to me because Diane is an extremely small Asian girl and kind of the last person you expect to be really into jiujitsu. Naturally, one thing led to another and I am rolling around on the carpet with Richard Brodie's girlfriend.
As dinner wrapped up, some of us could not resist the siren call of the big cash games. Gavin informed me that the games on Monday night were a lot smaller, but that actually worked out for us since none of us had a ton of cash on us. We decided to go to the airport (at 1am, mind you) and try to get a one-way rental where we drop the car off in LAX. Apparently this results in a ridiculous premium; a $50/day car rental suddenly turned into a $150/day rental. After verifying all the car companies (the ones that were still open at LAX, anyway) wanted similarly exorbitant rates, we called off Operation Commerce and Bree took us back to our hotels (with, naturally, a mandatory stop at Tropical Smoothie Cafe). We once again get an obligatory few hours of sleep before our respective flights.
I manage to set my cab driver on immediate tilt when I ask her to take me via Paradise Rd instead of the freeway. At first she did not respond to my request and I assumed she was just the chatty type. Then five minutes later she blurted out, "I can't believe this; I must be trippin' (yes, she was white): it's only 9:30am and you're the second person..." and let the sentence trail off. Eventually she just says, "I really hate this job on Tuesdays." I ignore her, and a few minutes later she asks, "I'm really curious to see how much this fare ends up being. Have you ever actually taken this route from downtown?" I respond, "yes. It's 6 miles this way and 9 miles by the freeway." "Oh," she responds, and doesn't say anything else until we get to the airport.
The fare comes out to $21.80. I consider stiffing her because of her attitude, but I actually want to get the point across that just because someone would prefer not to get long-hauled doesn't mean they are a cheap-ass, so I tip her modestly. She seems appreciative and pleasantly wishes me farewell. I feel as though I've done something positive for Vegas tourists without pissing anyone off. Others who feel more strongly about this issue may have thought I should have done something insane like call the taxicab authority, but I really don't have that kind of thing in me any more.
Anyway, I arrive at McCarran quite early, and it is extremely dead there. Everything was a breeze to the gate; the TSA security screener even made fun of my hat. I'm now posting this from Sea-Tac Airport en route back to Vancouver. At the risk of invoking the wrath of the airplane travel gods, I am considering this a great trip and I am glad I did it at the last minute.
Staying put for two weeks, and then it's APPT Macau!
I arrived at the Golden Nugget around 8am and slept a couple more hours on Spencer's spare bed. After getting up around noon I wandered over to Binion's to see who might be around. Apparently there was some super-satellite to a tournament at the Playboy Mansion, so there were a lot of the standard jokes about why I wasn't playing in the tournament. For the record, (although I'm sure everyone knows this) I obviously have nothing against the Playboy Mansion itself. It's an interesting little tourist trap and people should go if they get the opportunity.
Without any real plans until dinner at 6:30, I decided to phone up the Bellagio to find out what cash games they had going on. I was shocked and horrified by the response -- I was told the biggest game they had going there was 10/20 NL. I asked about limit games and they said all they had was an interest list for 60/120 ... and it had only two names on the list. I texted this to Gavin and he tried to convince me to come out to LA, where apparently the previous night there had been 400/800 limit hold'em, 300/600 razz and 200/400/50 NL 2-7. I suppose the Legends just moved all the action from Vegas to LA.
We -- by which I mean about 14 BARGErs -- had dinner at Rosemary's, which I'm sure I've raved about in the past. It's just a fantastic restaurant and arguably the best value in the city for a nice meal. Also, the waitress remembered me from when Hoss, Kenny and I ate there earlier in the WSOP and quite obviously thinks I'm cute.
On Wednesday, Kenny and I met up with Bree Goldman to go to lunch at Lotus of Siam. Apparently during lunch Lotus offers a buffet in addition to their usual a la carte menu. IMO the buffet isn't really as spectacular as their usual fare, but the price is right at like $10/person. I ate a lot and went back to the room and passed out until dinner, which was at, coincidentally enough, the Goldman's house. I am always treated like family by Dan and Sharon and they also invited all the remaining BARGErs, which ended up totaling a solid 20 people there. Among the people there were Richard "Quiet Lion" Brodie and his girlfriend Diane. I started talking with Diane and was amazed to learn that she had taken private lessons with Ryron and Rener Gracie for 12 years. This was pretty shocking to me because Diane is an extremely small Asian girl and kind of the last person you expect to be really into jiujitsu. Naturally, one thing led to another and I am rolling around on the carpet with Richard Brodie's girlfriend.
As dinner wrapped up, some of us could not resist the siren call of the big cash games. Gavin informed me that the games on Monday night were a lot smaller, but that actually worked out for us since none of us had a ton of cash on us. We decided to go to the airport (at 1am, mind you) and try to get a one-way rental where we drop the car off in LAX. Apparently this results in a ridiculous premium; a $50/day car rental suddenly turned into a $150/day rental. After verifying all the car companies (the ones that were still open at LAX, anyway) wanted similarly exorbitant rates, we called off Operation Commerce and Bree took us back to our hotels (with, naturally, a mandatory stop at Tropical Smoothie Cafe). We once again get an obligatory few hours of sleep before our respective flights.
I manage to set my cab driver on immediate tilt when I ask her to take me via Paradise Rd instead of the freeway. At first she did not respond to my request and I assumed she was just the chatty type. Then five minutes later she blurted out, "I can't believe this; I must be trippin' (yes, she was white): it's only 9:30am and you're the second person..." and let the sentence trail off. Eventually she just says, "I really hate this job on Tuesdays." I ignore her, and a few minutes later she asks, "I'm really curious to see how much this fare ends up being. Have you ever actually taken this route from downtown?" I respond, "yes. It's 6 miles this way and 9 miles by the freeway." "Oh," she responds, and doesn't say anything else until we get to the airport.
The fare comes out to $21.80. I consider stiffing her because of her attitude, but I actually want to get the point across that just because someone would prefer not to get long-hauled doesn't mean they are a cheap-ass, so I tip her modestly. She seems appreciative and pleasantly wishes me farewell. I feel as though I've done something positive for Vegas tourists without pissing anyone off. Others who feel more strongly about this issue may have thought I should have done something insane like call the taxicab authority, but I really don't have that kind of thing in me any more.
Anyway, I arrive at McCarran quite early, and it is extremely dead there. Everything was a breeze to the gate; the TSA security screener even made fun of my hat. I'm now posting this from Sea-Tac Airport en route back to Vancouver. At the risk of invoking the wrath of the airplane travel gods, I am considering this a great trip and I am glad I did it at the last minute.
Staying put for two weeks, and then it's APPT Macau!