So instead of wallowing in my busted out sorrow and just heading back to the hotel, I stopped at the Rio`s Avis counter and rented a car. Drove back to TI and as I headed up to the room I had to pass the Cirque de Solei theatre. There were a bunch of people standing outside the theatre saying that they needed extras for a movie. Their plug was that we got paid $50, got to see Cirque de Solei and would get free dinner... sounds good to me!

Turns out it was the guys from "40 year old virgin" that do the "You know how I know youre gay" bit. The movie is called "Knocked Up". It was fun, but very slooooow. Im sure if you are in the movie business you would be used to this, but it was a bit much for us since I had just rented a car. We stayed till dinner and got to see parts of Cirque, so I was happy. Plus I should be getting a check in the mail soon!






Then we headed out for a little sight seeing, went to the Hard Rock Casino, I was less than impressed, but Dave had to get someone a tshirt. Tried to get a Money Order cashed, who knew that would be such an ordeal. Then we headed downtown.






This was my first time in downtown Vegas and I loved it!! We tried to get at the $2 blackjack table at the 4 Queens, but they only had one and it was full of course, so we went to The Golden Gate instead for $3 blackjack. We played for HOURS and didnt get home till around 5am.


The next day I awoke earlier than Id of liked and decided to just get up and get going instead of going back to sleep. So I showered, hit Starbucks (god bless starbucks), picked up a gift for my girls that I had made and decided to throw my $10 voucher in a slot machine. Before I knew it my $10 had turned into over $60!! ON A TWO CENT SLOT! WOOT!!
I have been working on this post since I got back from Vegas and I have never managed to finish it. Of course after being gone for almost THREE weeks all together, I had a mountain of work to come home to, missed time with my kids, unpaid bills and the like. Then this past weekend we left on Friday to spend the weekend in Indiana for a wedding. Then this Monday I had to start the enrollment of one of my largest accounts… WHEW!

I’m sitting at my account now waiting for a meeting to finish so I thought Id try to type a bit up.

I think I left off at my first night downtown…… Of course Id never been to Fremont Street and I really like the feel of it. I liked being able to walk from casino to casino, seeing all the different places, less people, more relaxed… more for old boring people such as myself. AND WAAAY CHEAPER! So THIS is where all the cheap food is!! Cheap drinks, cheap gambling, cheap transportation… it is only a $2 bus ride straight down the strip, no cab necessary, and you don’t have to go thru all the pains of riding the bus since it’s a straight shot. Anyhow we played blackjack till about 4am then headed home. Oh, and ELVIS!!!

The next day we drove out to Hoover Dam and Lake Mead. I am definitely glad we made the short trip. Although we missed out on the Hoover Dam tour since we got there at about 10 after 5pm and the tours stopped at 5:15pm. We raced down to the tour area to try to get on the last tour, and at 5:16pm the doors were locked!! Damn lazy federal employees. But I still learned a lot, I had no idea that the Dam was in Arizona AND Nevada or that it powers not only NV and AZ but also most of Southern California! Pretty amazing place, especially when you realize it was built back in the 30`s. The memorial an artist designed was kind of all “Planet of the Apes”. The artist designed it so that millions of years from now when Aliens stumble across this huge thing in the middle of the desert they will know what it is…. *start the twilight zone music*. I found it strange that the powers that be at the time accepted such a monument.

I remember seeing Lake Mead from the air when we flew in and it was really beautiful, the water was so blue. When you are closer the water isnt quite as blue, but even in the 100 degree heat the water is cool. They charge you $5 just to drive up to the lake since it is a state park. Of course I had to go get in!! The bottom was VERY rocky, so if you ever decide to go for the day, be sure to wear your water socks.

Anyhow, that evening we still had the rental car, so we went back cleaned up and made some rounds. New York New York was our first stop. WOW this casino is KEWL!!! I would’ve liked to stay here a bit longer, but we had money to lose!! It was a really neat casino on the inside and I was surprised how much it looked like the city! Looked like a ton of fun. My brother ordered up a slice at the pizza shop because my husband is always telling us how awful our pizza is here in Ohio and the only real pizza is a “slice”. We didn’t ride the roller coaster, I was feeling a bit queasy, not sure if it was sleep deprivation or food deprivation, but I was not at my finest. On the way out I saw they have a Coyote Ugly bar there. I would have loved to go to it, I even mentioned we should go to Dave, but he wasn’t up for it, and didn’t know what a Coyote Ugly bar was!!!

Next we headed down to the Stratosphere. My tip for Vegas if you rent a car… TAKE THE HIGHWAY. The highway is a fast way to get anywhere, even just down the strip. We jumped on the highway right out of NY NYs garage and got off right at the Stratosphere. I was still feeling queasy when we got in the casino, so I sat at the bar for a sec and had a soda. When we went up to get our tickets to go to the top it was a 45 MINUTE WAIT! I wasn’t in the mood to wait in a line that long so I declined and we didn’t go up to the top. We did walk around a bit however, and that’s when I saw my LITTLE GREEN MEN slot machines!!!! These are my “lucky” machines. They have them here on the boats in Indiana that I’ve been to and I’ve won quite a bit of dough on them. I’ve found they have a system of payout, or at least I’ve convinced myself they do. But, just to prove it, I won EIGHTY DOLLARS on the ones in the stratosphere!!! So, now my slot winnings were way over $100 and I couldn’t wait to play poker the next night.

Once we got downtown, we headed over to the Mermaids place, which is MORE slot machines. We went there to get these HUGE frozen drinks they sell for $8 and someone told us they didn’t get cheap on the liquor. Then Dave wanted to show me the WHEEL OF FORTUNE slots since Id been having good luck with them. It was a 2 cent slot and I won $35 off of my original $4 I put in. WOOOOT.

Then we went back over to the Golden Gate for $3 blackjack. I was up about $25 right at the beginning, and ended up leaving down $30. It was brutal and I said.. F THIS I’m going back to my slots, where I lost another $20, guess my luck was over. That’s when I bugged Dave to leave already, I was exhausted. Another night we don’t get to bed till 5am.

Thursday I actually slept in!!! I guess Id had enough and my brain decided to let me sleep. Which felt really good to get some good rest. I took the rental car back in the AM and came back and went BACK to sleep! I didn’t get up till about 5pm. I had reserved this day for poker playing; after all I couldn’t come to Vegas without an all night poker bender now could I!!!

So the first thing we did was catch a cab over to the Bellagio to try out the buffet and get another glimpse of the poker room. I was gonna check out the stakes here as well to see if I could afford to play there. The buffet was INCREDIBLE. And overall Id have to say it beats out the Rio, although the Rio is still fantastic. But the Bellagio just has a better selection in my opinion. But I like to try new foods, and new mixtures, which the Bellagio had. The Rio has an awesome spread, it’s just more traditional. I mean the Bellagio has KING CRAB instead of snow crab, if ya get my drift.

I got one last look at the poker room and the 2/5 nlhe game was a bit too rich for my blood. The min buy in was $200, which is what I had, and I didn’t want to sit down with the minimum and get run over. So I decided I wanted to go back downtown to Binions and play the $1/$2 nlhe game there, where the min buy in was $100.

What a great night!!! I was up, down, up, down, even, up, down, but having an awesome time and pretty much freerollin. When I first sat down I got put at a “must move” table, which I had never heard of. For those of you that don’t know, it’s a table that feeds the other tables, so as tables open up at the full games they move each of you in order. This first table was not much to talk about, other than I laid down pocket 5s to a re raise, but was soon moved.

At first my table consisted of myself, 4 or 5 regulars and this crazy woman that had been at my feeder table. I ended up busting her when I hit top pair, was short stacked and pushed in after she checked the flop. She called me, with what she said was two pair, but I ended up making a straight on the river. I had gotten short stacked when T8o beat my J8s. At first I was a little leery cause it was obvious more than one of these players played here often and that’s what they did for a living. I was trying to stay out of their way as to not be a victim, but when the one guy busted the other guy, I felt a little better. I watched two of the guys get in a pretty loud argument over talking at the table, which was pretty funny.

I was drinking and having a great time!!! I was the ONLY one at the table drinking too. Well, till about 4am when my boyzzzzz from Queens sat down. This is when the table turned into the FTF table. There was a tourist in Seat 1, Seats 2 and 3 were dealers from Binions that were off the clock, Seat 4 was one of the Queens guys, Seat 5 was me, Seat 6 was a regular, Seat 7 was a regular and a war Vet who was happy when he won and really pissy when he lost, Seat 8 was a guy who was still in the main event, and he was HAWT. I enjoyed looking at him for most of the evening!! And seat 9 was the other guy, Will, from Queens.

The Queens boys were crackin me up for the rest of my night, even though I had gotten short stacked again to about $57 from my original $180 I stuck around, just for the fun of it. I pushed in a couple of times with QQ and AKd and the like, but a raise did me no good with my stack. Id get 5 callers just with the intent of them busting me, so I quit raising and just pushed in when I got a hand. Soon, I got K8d in the BB and got to check it. I flopped top two pair, and although there were two clubs on the flop, I pushed in. The guy that was on my right says “If he calls, I’m gonna have to call too” LOL he almost fell over when he leaned to whisper it to me. I said “Good”. Then the guy to my left calls and so does the guy from Queens. The flush didn’t come in and I tripled up!!!!

The hawt guy ended up leaving and got replaced by a young kid that bought in with the minimum. I was limping/calling with my small pocket pairs all night, just trying to hit a set, and finally did out of position. The flop came A high with my 7 for a set, so I bet out hoping this guy had an Ace. He called and the turn came a blank, but bringing a flush draw, so I bet out again. He says “Oh forget it, I’m all in” Of course I call, I was hoping he had the Ace, but he had the flush draw and it didn’t come in. I busted a hot shot flush drawer at Binions!!! And now I was up to $288!!!!

Two hands before I busted this guy I had said I was leaving on my button. After I was up so much I kinda felt bad so I played a few more orbits. When I did get up one of the Dealers that was in the game mentioned how long Id been there. I was there AT LEAST 8 hours so it was time for me to go. When I walked outside it was DAYLIGHT!!! Woohooo, what a great last night in Vegas! If you look close, Im in this picture.

Our final day we got up, went and checked out the Venetian, which was across the street, grabbed something to eat and we meant to catch the Pirate show at Treasure Island, but we missed it. My only regret in Vegas, missing the Sirens of TI.

What a great time I had, and I’m glad I made the most of it and didn’t go sulking around after I busted out of the WSOP. I will for sure be back, and I would recommend to ANYONE who is into poker to visit Vegas those first days of the WSOP, it is really something to experience.