So I am standing naked on the balcony at the Imperial Palace...

Before we talk about being drunk in Vegas, I feel the need to comment on something. My cell phone service totally sucks. About a year ago, I ditched my land line for a cell phone. That may have been a huge mistake because my cell service doesn't really cover where I live. I can walk about 3 blocks away and have good service, but not inside my house. There is a spot inside the bedroom where I may get really good service but it can cut out at any point.

Why am I bitching about cell phones? Yesterday I am out at the grocery store doing my food buying thing- 72 slices of cheese to be exact- when I get home I notice a message. There was no vibrating in my pants. I check to see Mr. AlCantHang had called. My eyes light up like a fat guy staring at a double cheeseburger. Could I have been selected? I try to get the message but the service crackles in and out. I even go to the sweet spot in the bedroom. I get half the message but I hear the 3 words every drunk hopes to hear- Dial A Shot. I try to call him back but the call isn't going through. Half hour later, no good. One last try has me cursing out Cingular. Sonsabitches!!!

So I say to Mr. CantHang, I apologize for my craptacular phone. There is only one thing to do. I must fill the flask with some Cabo Wabo before heading out on the camping expedition. Ironically, I will have better service in the middle of nowhere than I will at my own house. If for some reason we do not connect, know that a toast has been raised. And if we do connect, have the Brewers/Phillies score handy.

I now return you to stuff you may want to read about....

I woke up on Friday a little groggy, crawled out of bed and stared outside the window. Beautiful view of the backside of the hotel. Between a building I can see part of Caesars. But I do notice a balcony. Don't know why it is here but it is. I slide the door open to see how warm it is outside. Nice day again. I go to take a shower. Once done I towel myself off and decide I am going out onto the balcony. So I am standing naked on the balcony of the Imperial Palace in Vegas looking around. Why? Because I can! Unless you are an 8 foot tall woman or a guy whose schlong resembles a lasso and you are roping something 3 floors below, no one will notice your nakedness with the 5 foot concrete slab covering you. And if someone did see me out there, why the hell are you looking at a naked white guy with a beer gut for anyways?

So when the boys were finished getting some fresh air, I went back in to get dressed and walk to the Rio. Yes, walk to the Rio. Nothing looks too far off when you are in Vegas. Case in point. Remember the old monorail that connected MGM to Ballys. Yeah, it is still there as part of the new monorail but on that thing at MGM, you could see the Hilton. The Hilton did not look that far away even though it was on the opposite end of the strip and a couple blocks off. That is how the Rio looks. Not that far off. Even when you take a cab, it doesn't seem that far. I figured that if I can walk to the MGM from the IP, this walk may even be shorter. So I started to march off but ran into construction. So much for that idea. Over to JC's place to get a cab.

I went early to the Rio to show support for the boys who were lucky enough to be playing through the blogger satellites. I ran into Otis right away. He gave me the lowdown on where everything was going down later. I then walked to the convention area where the games were to be played. Kinda amazing seeing over 200 poker tables layed out. This was going to be a sight at the very least. I bummed around there a bit and then went back to the cafe for breakfast hoping to meet up with some people.

One thing I was truly looking forward to on this trip was meeting a wide variety of people. This group I would be playing cards and hanging out with is such a diverse group that I hoped to talk to many different bloggers. At the cafe, I met up with Bobby Bracelet, Joe Speaker, Russ Fox, and the Poker Geek. I talked with the Poker Geek for 15 minutes about the movies he makes. Had the chicken fried steak (of course!) before we headed off to watch the boys play.

I was a bit disappointed that I couldn't play in the event. Well, I technically could have if I wanted to wait 5 hours in line to register and then wait in a corner for another hour and a half hoping for a chance to play. Maybe next year. The tournament started a half hour late. Can't blame them as they are trying to coordinate over 2400 people. Beer wasn't cheap in there either at $5.75 a pop. I watched various bloggers play for about an hour before I needed to sit down. On the way out I watched some of the pros for a while. Nothing to exciting. Outside the hall I ran into some other bloggers again. They were out there with Phil Hellmuth getting pictures taken. I was off to play some poker myself. That of the pai gow variety.

For those who do not know, Pai Gow translates into something like "crap". It means bad hand or something to that effect. So if the dealer has pai gow, you are likely to win. But not always as I would find out. After a couple hours and couple hundy later, I walked away a beaten man. Cards were brutal to me. I did run into a guy I had played with at Badger Poker. He is referred to as the Marine in those reports. He played in Event 2 but never really caught any good cards. Tough break for him.

As I was saying though, a couple of hours and numerous brewskis later, I headed back in to see how everyone was doing. Only Otis was still alive. Watched until he moved his short stack in and was beaten. Hope he had some last longer bets on. Soon the dinner break would come and Dr. Pauly led a bunch of us over to the Excalibur to storm the castle.

I must say I enjoyed shooting the shit with the good doctor and his brother Derek. Good people to say the least, though I didn't notice any real New Yawk accent from either of them.

When we got to the castle, I sat down at a cemetary like table. I felt like checking these people for a pulse. Behind me was a table with a number of bloggers already whooping it up and I felt like I was sent to the kiddie table. I thought one of the old farts was going to raise with Geritol. Any bet/raise could buy a pot which isn't necessarily bad but who wants to win a bunch of $4 pots? I played about an orbit before I got up to request a table change. Thankfully I was able to hop into a new 4/8 half kill game.

I sat down next to CJ. Across from me was an old gent with a bolo tie. Apparently he is a regular who hadn't been in for a number of days. This old coot was a riot. His one liners were priceless. I bet he got some tail that night. Two older ladies would sit down on the other end and some other dude in the middle. Soon it would become a mini blogger table as BadBlood and Otis would sit down. Enjoyed talking with Mr. Blood and meeting his wife. Heard of her excursion to the M&M store. Learned they had 4 floors in that store. 4 floors of M&freakinMs?!?!?! Saw the cool poker chips they bought the kids. Gotta like parents who buys kids poker chips. I have a lot of fun in this game. Defending the kill was a must and won me some good pots. But the hand of the night belonged to CJ. He layed down the hammer on a unsuspecting victim. One of the ladies at the end called his raise. Flop came with two 7s. The case 7 was on the river (I believe). When the lady saw her pocket kings were slammed by the hammer, she got pissed, got up and left. Hilarious! The look on her face was priceless. The other yokels at the table still had no clue what the hell they were in for. But it did one thing. It loosened them up. Any time one of the bloggers raised, they had suspicions about what other crap hands we were playing. They had no clue whether they were coming or going. A number of other players would sit down at the table, play a couple hands, see the chips being flung around with the jackhammer and leave. Sad part was the game wouldn't go on all night. It broke up soon and I was moved to another table before getting moved back to a blogger table.

There I had a couple of brutal suckouts by Bobby Bracelet and -EV. But I was up for the night and had a good time. It seemed late when the table broke. Tomorrow was to be a drunkfest so I figured a bit of sleep would be good and headed back.

Coming up....the Aladdin and the post party, the surly lesbian waitress, the ahole at the Mirage, and the drunk at the Imperial.