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I landed in Vegas two nights ago. Krantz, Flawless, and Whitelime weren’t in town and I didn’t have our rental car two days ago, so I was bored out of my mind. I went to the Bellagio and played some 50-100 Badeucey because there were no NL games running. Badeucey, for those of you who don’t know, is a triple-draw split-pot game where half the pot goes to the best 2-7 hand and the other half goes to the best badugi hand. It was pretty fascinating and while I normally think I’m a fish in these kinds of games, in this case I saw a lot of poor play that made me think that the 3 regs playing weren’t particularly good. It’s always fun to play a new game and I may spend some time this summer trying to figure out these mix games.
Anyway, I looked around empty Bellagio poker room and decided to go play a $1,000 NL tournament. I would normally never bother with this, but again, there was nothing else to do. At dinner break the first day I picked up some food at Bellagio and planned on eating dinner while playing some 4-handed 25/50 NL with the 5k I had on me. My first hand I 3bet a UTG open from the BB and got a fold. The next hand I picked up AK, 3bet a UTG, and just when I thought I had the perfect table image to get paid off, I instead ran into QQ, ran it twice, and lost both. The next day I cashed and got eliminated very late in the day, so for my 2 days of sitting around on my ass I profited $2300, which didn’t even cover my losses from that 2-handed dinner session. Fun stuff.
Sitting around a casino, having to time your trips to the bathroom based on what position you’re in, sitting by smelly poker players. It’s all pretty brutal. I really can’t believe some people play live tournaments for a living. Given that once you’re in the money, for no real reason, you can’t even put your headphones in and have to listen to some random hyperfriendly but douchey frat boy tell all of the meme-iest poker jokes, the tournament experience just becomes more unbearable. So, given that I know all this and hate tournaments, I obviously registered for the $5,000 NL shoot-out today and busted.
Fortunately, I played some 25/50 NL at Bellagio and ran pretty well. After going to Lotus of Siam for dinner, I had a severe food coma and wanted to go home at the end of the dealer’s shift. The dealer then hooked me up with 77 on a 578 rainbow, which I played a 20k pot with and won, and then the next hand I opened with [CARDS OMITTED] UTG, got one call, and Peachy Keen called in the big. He donked three times on 5692Q flush draw board and I raised him from 3200 to 9k on the river with 11 behind. He tanked and folded, but either way I was on a little heater.
Lotus of Siam, by the way, is one of the true treasures of Las Vegas. It’s a mom-and-pop Thai restaurant with inexpensive food. The food is arguably the best Thai food in the entire world (or at least outside of Thailand) and it’s just pretty awesome that you can go get this insanely good meal at some random little restaurant in a small strip mall off the strip. They say that it’s the small spots that you find off the strip without all the glitz and glamor that really make Vegas a special place. I would say that that’s wrong and that the fine restaurants in casinos are more of a draw, but it’s definitely true that if you’re ever in Vegas you should check out Lotus of Siam
