Casino's: A review of my experiences: Atlantic City

I've told everyone about my first WSOP Circuit event cash because that's a fun story to tell.  Now lets go to the other side of things and discuss the first WSOP Circuit event that I played in... in Atlantic City.  My girlfriend bought me into the event as a gift which is the best present she could have gotten me. 

The trip was interesting to say the least.  We flew into PA and took a train which was a fun experience...for the most part.  It was the first time my girlfriend has ridden a train so that at made it better.  First things first though, everything about Philly pretty much sucked.  Everyone in the airport was so rude and it seemed like I was causing them an inconvenience to make me a coffee...when it's their freakin JOB!!!!  All in all, we had to go to three different shops before we found a place that we didn't leave before they made our coffee.  That city must suck.  On this train ride, we had to make one connection. Since it was freezing cold out we didn't want to stand outside so we stood right inside of a covered glass area.  To keep this part of the story short, the train that we were supposed to get on was in and out before we could get on...in fact, I'm not even sure that it stopped.  I think it slowed down to a jogging pace threw some people out, I think one guy jumped as the door was closing at which point they were back up to full-speed.  In the end we got to Atlantic City.

We stayed at Harrahs because we heard it was one of the nicer places to stay there and it definitely was.  Prior to the tourney my girlfriend and I played around, hit some video poker, wasted some money in some slots for a bit then I got ready for my tourney.  What we found is the negative effect that keeping tight slot machines and horrible odds has on everyone in this entire city.  We walked around for hours and didn't hear 1 person scream, didn't hear one jackpot being hit, and never heard anyone anywhere happy about anything.  Here is how this snowballs down.  When players are losing their money ALL THE TIME with no real return to speak of they begin getting bad attitudes to the staff.  After hours, months, or years of dealing with bad attitudes, their attitudes then get bad.  The blackjack dealers weren't nice or inviting.  They never got excited, and they were openly happy to take peoples money.  It went a little something like this...4 people at a table and the dealer is showing a 6.  One player has 20 and stands, one has 18 and stands...one splits 9's to get 19 on each and one doubles down on 10 to make 20 for the rest of his chips.  The dealer never smiles once....until he turns over his other card and sees a 5... when the 10 hits he might as well say 'BOOOO-YAAA, in your face b*tches...I'll take that, I'll take that, awwwww...you're broke, peace out'.  Yep, that about sums it up.  This in turn has a negative effect on the attitude of generally happy players and the cycle continues.  At least I hope this is how it happens and it's not just that everyone in New Jersey is just that unhappy and generally horrible.  But then again, that's the back-up hypothesis.

So, that about sums it up. AC was pretty dirty, not a lot of fun, and you could cut the hostility in the air with a knife everywhere you went.  Not good for my Qi.

As for the tournament, I made some rookie mistakes like not noticing that the blinds changed once and raising under the minimum because of it.  Good learning experience and I missed cash by 20-30 players or so.

Next review will be for Reno I believe.  Until then:  Good luck in everything that you attempt.

Delayed post and frustration

It’s been a while since I’ve written and the reason is two-fold.  I’ve been in Vegas for my friend Ken's bachelor party.  That was a lot of fun seeing everyone but lesson learned, no more house/casino games for me.  All in all I would have paid for the whole trip w/ poker/video poker but broke even/lost a bit due to blackjack and craps.  Craps is not out of the question for the future but I will stay away from all other games.  While there I was in a cash game w/ a guy who was dumping money left and right 2-3 seats to the left of me.  Everyone was picking up pots against him and he just kept going back to the wallet.  Then, he raises to 20 blind on our 1-2 table.  I look at QQ from sb… so I make it 60 and tell him, you have to check the cards now bud…. He does and makes the call.  Flop comes K37r.  He shoves all in which he had been doing all day when he horribly missed.  I thought and thought about it and said, “figures you’d hit your 3 outter vs me” before making the call and flipping up my QQ to see his K3 sitting there.  Funny thing is that when he made the move he really thought he was behind.  I got that back and lifted about 700 more from other people at the table over the next hour and half but sick sick sick.  Nicest guy, just not a very good card player.  That mixed w/ a good amount of money moving around made it a fun game.


Once I got home I played a couple of nice sized events and qualified for a couple.  I got absolutely destroyed in all of them though, same ol same ol.  Now on to today and the two hands that will likely lead to me ending poker altogether (when combined with a full month of this exact same stuff).  First game is a 75$ buyin.  As usual I thought that by stepping up in by buyins the horrible palyers would be gone…not the case…exactly opposite it seems.  The hand that takes me out goes something like this.  I have KK and get all-in preflop.  The flop comes AKJ.  He has A9 sooooted.  Turn is a J and I’m thinking still good but this seems oddly familiar.  You know why it’s familiar?  Because now he has 2 outs to take this pot and vs me, that’s all you need…A on the river and I’m out, I say gg, and of course, wp because lets face it, this kind of play should be profitable when my karma debt is all paid up from a past life (apparently I was Hitler).  So, pretty bad hand right.  Lets move to the next tournament.  I mentally saved this one for everyone’s pleasure.  Now to set the table.  It’s mid/late in tourney, almost bubble time and me and the guy to my left have about 30 some odd BBs when I’m dealt QQ.  I raise and get reraised.  Playing him based on what I've seen from him I just call as to not get into a race because I know I can get him to ship it light later in the hand.  Flop is AQ8 rainbow.  I raise him only to see him snapshove over that.  Oh yes, I have the second best possible hand…and he has the best, turning over Aces.  Seriously?  If a Q doesn’t come I have the discipline to get away here and am likely the only player at the table with it but nooooo the ol cooler flop.  I say ‘wow’ ‘standard’.  And someone at the table says, "standard, no, that was a cooler".  My only response is, maybe for you.  For me, it’s standard, and it really has been lately.  Hence the reason that I’m thinking of hanging this poker thing up for a bit and coming back strong after buying a new house and saving up a new roll.  So, a reevaluation after I get some other things in order.


As always,  Good luck in everything that you attempt.

Blog 2 from WSOP Circuit event in New Orleans: Part 2- Reprint

Sorry about the delay in getting this second part up...I've had some internet troubles and this is the first chance I've had to update.  Enjoy the end of the trip:


Up to this point I've been playing solid poker...and am one of the most handsome people in the room...and I saved a mom and a baby from being hit by a train when their car stalled on some traintracks by stopping the train with my bare hands...yep, that about catches you up.

Once I got moved to a new table it was pretty easy to size it up and make some moves.  My next table move was a little (lot) more difficult.  The stack sizes at this table were massive and I had a guy to the right of me trying to steal every one of my blinds.  It doesn't take much for me to get tired of this so after the third time of raising my blind I shoved him all in after looking down and seeing Ace-Queen.  Although I don't feel that this was a mistake I was dissapointed to see him turn up AK after taking FOREVER to call it down.  One time for me... the Q flops out there and I double up.  It was an up and down battle from there and our table was soooo crazy.  I get in to double up w/ Ace-Ten vs. QK.  The board comes out 45678, both of us have a straight.  Then I try again w/ Ace-Nine and get Ace-Two to call me.  The board cards come 55448 se we both have 2 pair.  There were about 10 of these hands at my table and it was just getting funny.  This madness ended at 2:30 AM. 

I figured that the second day would be different but no, the beats just kept coming and I held on until 27th, pulled a new table and then got in w/ about a 40% chance to win...no dice this time.  So, out in 27th after about 14.5 hours of play.  I've gotta say, it's a bitter-sweet finish since once I got in the money I thought I could surely final table this thing, but then again, it is only my second WSOP Circuit event and I cashed in it.  I guess that's not bad considering a met an older genletman who has been doing this for 4 years and hasen't cashed in one...not sure I would continue if that was the case.  I'm thinking next year that I'll take a vacation during this period and play as many of these as I can during that week.  I'll take it down at some point.  All in all the experience gets a rating of 8.5 and I'll definitely do it again.  Thanks for any positive thoughts sent to me.  They helped.

As for the rest of the trip, it's been great seeing Crystals family and being involved with my first crawfish boil.  Definitely good food.  Perhaps we'll get some shipped down and have one down in FL sometime (perhaps next year).  I'll get some help from Crystals dad and brother to figure out how to boil these things but it's well worth it.  Who's coming if I set this thing up?  I suggest everyone...at least once in your life.

So, that's how it ended...I met some interesting people had a blast and made a little money.  I'll be making more time for live poker as I progress with this little hobby.

To continue this theme of reposting, I'm sifting through some old blog entries from another blog to see what fits here.  If they make the cut then they will be worth reading.

Until then:  Good luck in everything that you attempt.