Calistri's Corner

I had just finished sending an email to a professor yesterday that said I would be in Austin for the foreseeable future. Ten minutes later, I booked a flight to LA. I leave tomorrow. (more…)

Yesterday, remembering it was the first day of Chinese New Years, I bathed but didn’t wash my hair. Washing your hair on New Years could wash your luck away. I also put on my pair of red Jockey bikini underwear (bought on sale of course). Red is supposed to insure a bright future for the new year. I’m hoping that the year of the boar will live up to its straightforward and honest hype.  The only loyalty last year’s “dog” brought us was Frist’s to Leach, selling us out with the UIGEA in his failed attempt at a presidential bid.Â
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A lot of my motivation for going to Vegas was to play in the Women’s UPC event at Binions. But the state of my game and the strength of the field had me debating that decision up until the last minutes of registration. The longer I waited, the more WSOP bracelet winners took the field. But in the end, it was the quality of the field that drew me in. When was I ever going to get a chance to go up against the caliber of these players again? So in a totally “WTF” gesture, I threw my money down.Â
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Somewhere in the middle of my second day in Vegas, I find myself walking under the constructed ivory metal sky of the Fremont Experience. I like the honesty of Downtown in the light of day. On the strip, with its polished marble and posh themed casinos, the illusion of Vegas is too easily preserved. But as the Walmart shoppers shuffle past the now dated downtown facades, you know that this town was built on people risking money they can little afford to lose on a temporary non-life altering dream.  An equally sad and optimistic Dido melody hangs in the air; a song that clutches onto the silver lining of an otherwise joyless life. And yet in this moment, I love dowtown for all that it is and isn’t.  Â
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I think this is my eighth trip to Vegas in the past year- or maybe it’s my ninth. And other than a slightly delayed flight out of Austin, Day One in Vegas was everything I hoped for.Â
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I first met the award winning travel editor Jen Leo soon after she threw caution to the wind and moved to Las Vegas. Grown restless from her travel writing niche, her CA lifestyle, and a love life in denial, Jen decided to throw her lot in with poker - and the poker world has never been the same.
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As we strolled the university hallway last week, my professor told me that his family was going to spend a few months in China, leaving him behind to teach in Austin. He said, “I think I may need to develop a vice.” I immediately responded, “I’m the right woman for the job.”
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