IGGY at PokerWorks

“The spreadsheet with “vitals” on the bloggers includes a column labeled “Drinking?” Mine is one of the few boxes without an entry. While a few typed “Y” or even “Y Y Y,” many listed the particular concoctions they preferred. Others said things like “hell yeah,” “with both hands,” and “only when I’m awake.”

The whole weekend is going to be like a poker game in a distillery.”
Michael Craig

Alas, I’m bummed many of my favorite folks can’t make it this time. You shall be missed. But thankfully, many of my good friends will be there, as well as many new bloggers. I truly can’t wait to pound some beers and meet ya’ll.

A HUGE thanks to April for all her selfless work in putting all this together. Incredible job of getting us degenerates together - again. As Otis likes to say: it’s herding cats.

We have a flash mob - texting tree system together for passing along what the hell is going on. I’m highly amused at April’s comment to attendee’s:

Oh and yes, Daddy/Iggy and I are supposed to be on the texting tree twice.

Our bad reputations precede us.

An excellent resource for those of you unfamiliar with our now infamous blogger Gatherings in Las Vegas would be to visit the Good Doctor’s blog for his 20 rules of surviving in Vegas. For the record, this will be my fifth appearance. Pauly stuck up all his all posts from the beginning - awesome reading. Go hit Tao of Poker for hours of seeing where all this craziness began.
Two days and counting, damnit. Weeeee!

Before I start rocking and rolling with the poker, allow me a hoist of the Guinness to my friends blogging at the new UpForSports blog. That’s the most formidable lineup of writers I’ve ever seen on one lone blog, with the exception of here at PokerWorks. Suffice to say, go read it now.

Some other fine pre-blogger Gathering linkage includes FTrain’s retrospective from our first one. I also really enjoyed JMC’s fine birthday tribute to Otis. I highly recommend playing poker with the boys from St. Louis if you get a chance. Good times.

I played a good bit of poker this past weekend. I came home Friday night and decided to play a multi, for the first time, in a long time (outside of blogger shenanigans) and found a $150 NL. 19th place out of 900 players gave me nearly a grand score - not bad for an insanely drunken Friday evening.
The sad good part of this story is early in the morning, down to three tables, when I realized I was far too trashed to continue playing, despite some nice prize money at stake.

Guinness > Iggy

I was forced to make a late, late night emergency call to GMoney to finish the tournament for me. I woke up Saturday morning thinking that it had all been a dream. Perhaps one of these days I’ll grow up.

On Saturday evening, I discovered PL08, for really the first time. I’ve just never had the stomach for pl08 before - considering it the ultimate gambling game - not something I was interested in doing while I was paying my bills with poker. But now with a steady job, healthy bankroll and a slow night, I figgered gambling was just what I needed.

Here’s what I pasted to a buddy two hours into the game:
Dealer: Game #7273696863: Guinness wins Hi pot ($815.40) with a full house, Jacks full of Deuces Dealer: Game #7273696863: There is no low hand

Well, well. There’s my intro to pot-limit O8. Beginners luck, methinks, although I have begun to do some reading on the game. But regardless, I’m a terrible, terrible o8 player - something I hope to fix and enjoy the learning on the way. For now, I’m folding everything and attempting to peddle the nuts. Lame but +EV for me thus far.

It seems like the game is one of hitting homeruns. Big hands and big pots. Folding everything else. I’m probably wrong about this but I’m trying to learn.

Ugh, Omaha is not a game for the weak.
Sure, they are the salt of the earth but they ain’t gonna get the money.

Maudie is getting a tattoo in Vegas. Too damn cool. I just wish she had better taste…..

So let’s bang this post out, shall we? I’ve got all sorts of random poker tales here - ultimately concluding with a Las Vegas stripper story/advice for the ages.

Click on some banners here, people. Don’t make me grovel, damnit. I’ve done it before and it ain’t pretty.

And so I was digging around for some reading on Omaha when I found this post asking about Rolf’s new pot limit book. I always liked Rolf, way back in the day. God, I ain’t read in him in years, tho.

Here’s someone asking about the quality of the book with a review:

Rolf Slotboom Pot-Limit Omaha book, any good?

I’m wondering if the Slotboom book is any good. My bullshit detector goes off with titles starting with “Secrets of. . .” but I’ve read some reasonably good stuff by him. Is this one any good, or are there better books?

——————
I’m honestly having trouble getting through it. He spends a lot of time stating and justifying a simple short-stack strategy.

1. Buy in short.
2. Sit immediately to the right of an overly aggressive player.
3. Limp or make a small raise with premium starting hands, including double-suited medium connectors.
4. Re-raise, catching all of the players in the middle.

The idea is to pick up the dead money from the other players and benefit from the deep stacks knocking each other out late in the hand.

I’m convinced this is a good strategy in the right game, but the repetition is tedious. There are many, many pages regarding short-stacked play.

I was pretty excited when I made it to the deep-stack section, where I learned to look out for short stacks playing premium hands. (I exaggerate; there’s some more. The later streets don’t get theattention they deserve though, imho.)

I’m enjoying (and learning more from) the “classic articles” more, even the ones I’ve read before.

> Is this one any good, or are there better books?

I’m not aware of anything comparable. The SS2 chapter and Ciaffone/Reuben’s Pot-limit and No-limit Poker have some good stuff.

I’ve been critical of the presentation, but it’s taught me things about the game.

The idea of a strategy of buying in short bugs the hell out of me. I want to extract as much money as I can. Playing short stacked is just leaving money on the table, imho. I’m sure this strategy has much to do with the greater volatility in plo8, but still.

I have to read mucho nutty stuff for you, gentle reader, in my quest for the best of poker on the web. But here’s an off-topic post that bummed the hell out of me.A sobering tale of man’s inhumanity to man.

OT- A man died today….What the fuck is wrong with people? I manage a restaurant and today one of my regular customers came in. After getting served, he walked over to get a drink and fell to the ground. 3 customers (a doctor and 2 nurses) started to perform CPR. 911 was called. The gentleman was on the floor by the drinks and 3 people were performing CPR–think about that for a second. As I try to backpeople up from the man who was receiving CPR, I get the first question.

“Are they almost done? I want to get a drink refill.”

First thought that comes to my mind is that she doesn’t realize what has happened. I explain to her what is going on and she says “Oh, well can you get me a drink?”
I brushed her off and then I get the second question.

“Are they gone to move him anytime soon?”

This time by a man who was standing there. I was taken aback, and asked him to leave. Instead of leaving, he took a seat as close as possible towhere the man was.

Again there was another request for a drink and another person asking if they could get by. I looked around and took in what was going on, and itdisgusted me.

People were eating while watching this man die. The table next to where he fell didn’t even get up and move for the people performing CPR. Theydidn’t even stop eating.

People acted as if they were inconvienced by a man dying. People didn’t even have the decency to look away when the paramedics had to strip his clothes off. One person even asked in a loud voice “Mr. Paramedic, is he dead?”

To you people, I want to say “WHAT THE FUCK IS WRONG WITH YOU?” A man died today and you acted like you didn’t care, a man died, don’t you understand that. What the fuck is wrong with you people, that’s all I want to know. A man died and you were inconvienced.

Fuck you.
Black

Blah. The above story wouldn’t suck so much if I wasn’t so sure of it’s veracity.

Let’s change things up quickly. WSOP champion, Greg Raymer as Vice-Prez of the USA? Geez, I’d vote for him tomorrow. Check out this fine interview from Pokernews:

Poker Champ and Vice Presidential Candidate?: An Interview with Greg Raymer

Having said that, I am currently talking to some people who run the Libertarian Party about the possibility of running to be the party’s official candidate for Vice President of the United States. With a few exceptions, I would support the official planks of the Libertarian Party.

It seems that the masterminds at 2+2 have heard my pleas and set up a special David Sklansky forum just for all things DS. I hope someone asks him how many five year olds he could take on at one time.

I was pretty surprised by the following question. Sometimes I forget that your average poker player ain’t the brightest bear in the woods. But Gary Carson thankfully set this guy straight. Good God, can we get Gary to a blogger gathering one of these days?

Jesus doesn’t know fold equityI’ve been working my way through ESPN’s pay-per-view broadcast of the WSOP final table. When it’s down to final 3, Chris Ferguson was guest host with Jeff Gordon and his broadcast partner (Ali something, forget his name). The hosts were taking audience emails and a question came in for Jesus asking him to explain Fold Equity. Jesus’s answer: Ihave no idea what fold equity is. So Jeff Gordon had to explain it.

My jaw dropped. A 5-time bracelet winner never heard of fold equity? WTF? Can anyone explain this shocking lack of knowledge of a basicpoker concept?

Jeff Gordon? Nice.

Gary’s response:

He knows it called by something else - he knows the damn concept fer gods sakes

> I’ve always called it “bet equity”. (Copyright 2001)

Bet equity would include the value from a call. Total bet equity is the wieghted average of value from him calling and the value from him folding, weighted by the probability of him calling/folding (and raising too, but we canignore that for pursposes of this narrow discussion).

Nobody means that when they say fold equity. Most mean the value you gain if he folds. I’m guessing Chris would prefer to think of fold equity as that valuetimes the probability of the fold. But he just didn’t want to get into it.

He knows what it is. He just thinks it’s an inappropriate term to use for the concept and that was his way of expressing his disapproval.

The term is somewhat confusing. You gain equity when someone else folds and give up their equity. Your gain is a funciton of their fold, not a function ofany action you might have taken.

If A checks, B bets, C folds, A calls, then A has gained some of the equity that C had owned before.

The gain, and amount of the gain is the same as if A bets B calls and C folds.

When analyzing stratagy the focus should be on your action, not someone elses.

Often though when people use the term they don’t really mean fold, they mean the equity you gain from your bet. i.e. A component of the expected value of a betwhich reflects both the probability of a fold and the equity gain from the fold.

So, the term is ambigious and Chris didn’t know for sure how the question meant the term. So he was just being a smart ass.

Gary Carson

Just goes to show that it takes one to know one.

Barry Greenstein was also interviewed over at Poker News. Tis a fine interview - Barry is a great guy, by all accounts. But the feller who did the interview posted on 2+2 and gave us the question that WASN’T answered in the interview.

Scoop here:

You guys would be proud of me for asking this one even though it didn’t survive the editor’s blue pen. Anyway, what better evidence of Mr. Greenstein being a world class guy than that he answered it? In the words of an old English legend, “say no more, say no more.”

BC: Barry, last question, and it’s a playful one. It seems like you have a preference for Asian women. Why are they superior to all others? Did you decide, after years of experience, they were a positive expectation play?

Barry Greenstein: It just happens that there are more Asian women than non-Asian women in my workplace (poker rooms in California). Also, I’m only 5’8”, and most men are attracted to women who are shorter than they are, which in my case is normally true with Asian women.

So now you know.

Found these two 2+2 threads where a Full Tilt Poker “spokesman” is answering questions and handling suggestions and everything else under the sun. A fine idea - I wish more sites engaged the community - it’s in their best interest.

FTP Answers 11/10

FTP Answers 11/29

While I’m on the topic of Full Tilt Poker, allow me to share this interesting post about one of the big games:

An example of the nuttiness of pro play at FTP

Last night in a six-handed 100/200 NL game, Dave Oppenheim (never heard of him) sat in with $10,000. He immediately doubled up on TeeDitty when Tee called Oppenheim’s all in after the flop and Oppenheim’s pocket aces held up.

A couple of hands later and this time it was a pre-flop battle between the same two guys. Oppenheim goes all in with AK and TeeDitty calls with pocket 3’s. The board pairs twice with overcards to the threes and Oppenheim doubles up to $40K even though he doesn’t catch a real hand. He had the twopair with the ace kicker.

Matusow was sitting at the same table and he was mostly folding, not catching a hand for a long while. Then he went nuts with all-in bets and calls and he built back up. One of the better players I have witnessed over the past few weeks is sbrugby who sat in the game with about $80K at the time, dutifully folding amidst all the madness. I suspect sbrugby is Howard
Lederer, but that’s only a guess.

The play is crazier at this level than even the no-limit micro games. I didn’t think that was possible. I rarely see such specious calls pre-flop with holdings like a low pair or AK in the 5/10 and lower on Stars. I think what makes these players being perceived as “great” is that they don’t seem to care about the money, at least at these stakes.

And call me nuts, but I think when AK versus 33 comes with a board of 88JJ9, 33 should win. Yeah, I know, five best cards, but sometimes this rule doesn’t seem right.

I like how he thinks Howard Lederer is playing in the $100/200 NL game even though Howard runs the damn site. I won’t even comment on his last point. Oh the humanity.

Let’s shift our gaze from Full Tilt Poker to Ultimate Bet. Future post note: I’ve got some fine, amazing datamined figures from some of these games. Stay tuned! Here’s a recap with a hand history or two for us slummers:

Big PLO game on UltimateBet
If anyone happens to be on Ultimate Bet right now, you can catch a big PLO game between Prahlad Friedman and some guy from Belgium. They are playing $50/100, and there is over a half a million dollars in play. That’s more than 50 rebuys between the two of them (max buy-in is $10K). They are playing on two tables, heads-up. It looks like Prahlad is getting the best of it.

The biggest hand of the night is below, for just under a quarter of a million dollars. They were both deep-stacked with over $100K each, and Prahlad flopped the nut straight, and the Belgium dude flopped a set ofJacks, but never improved.

Hand #34296068-1806 at Centennial (Pot Limit Omaha)
Powered by UltimateBet

im sleeping is at seat 0 with $111702.50.
Shadowclowns is at seat 1 with $131175.50.
The button is at seat 0.

im sleeping posts the small blind of $50.
Shadowclowns posts the big blind of $100.

im sleeping: — – — –
Shadowclowns: — – — –

Pre-flop:

im sleeping raises to $300. Shadowclowns re-raises to
$900. im sleeping calls.

Flop (board: Jc 7s Td):

Shadowclowns bets $1800. im sleeping raises to $7200.
Shadowclowns re-raises to $23400. im sleeping
re-raises to $72000. Shadowclowns calls.

Turn (board: Jc 7s Td 2d):

Shadowclowns goes all-in for $58275.50. im sleeping
goes all-in for $38802.50. Shadowclowns is returned
$19473 (uncalled).

River (board: Jc 7s Td 2d 6h):

(no action in this round)

Showdown:

Shadowclowns shows 2s Jd Jh 2h.
Shadowclowns has Jd Jh Jc 7s Td: three jacks.
im sleeping shows 9s 6s 9d 8s.
im sleeping has 9s 8s Jc 7s Td: straight, jack high.

Hand #34296068-1806 Summary:

$.50 is raked from a pot of $223405.
im sleeping wins $223404.50 with straight, jack high.

Lord, I’m getting Guinness-fueled here. I’m not sure anyone realizes how long it takes to uber this up. Tis quite the long haul, lemme tell ya. Sadly, my alcohol tolerance has plummeted like a stone since I went back to work. Drinking with impunity, night after night, is only a distant memory in my rearview mirror.

I’m also busy as hell at work, I might add. And that’s a Good Thing. I can honestly say it’s the best job I’ve ever had - hopefully I’m not jinxing myself by saying this out loud. I’m lucky, damnit.

Anyway, back to poker. Let’s post another situational comedy here at Poker Works.

Yikes! FLOOR!

Opinions on this rather heated clash at a cash game
I was playing 1-2 NL and I had about $300 in front of me. I started with
$80 so I was doing well.

Anyway, I had the button with pocket 3’s and it was raised to $12 by middle position.
I called and the SB called.

Flop
5-5-3 rainbow.
All check to me and I check.
Turn card was a 10.

Check-middle position bets $40

I say to the dealer “I’ll put him (middle position) all in.”

Middle position starts pushing his stack in while he says “Call” (roughly $60) but I tell him to hold on as 1st player is yet to call that bet. SB folds.

I turn over pocket 3’s. Middle position sees it but he says “I fold” as he hasn’t put his chips in the middle yet. He turns over A-5.

I told him to get his money in there as he said he called earlier. He throws his cards in the muck. Dealer was stunned and didn’t know what to make of it.

Yes, I did get pissed and told the player “you called! You verbally announced it so get your money in there.”

He got up and walked away. No poker player on this planet is going to fold A-5 when the flop is 5-5-3. The whole table was stunned and they all agreed it was verbally announced but the dealer said technically, he called out of turn and he wasn’t obliged to call once the cards were face up.

The dealer also said it was bad poker ettiquette on his part if he actually KNEW he was calling out of turn to get me to turn my cards up before he actually made the call.

I was so far up in chips that it didn’t bother me that much that he didn’t call but I hate players who bend the rules that much. If I had made that same move, calling out of turn, then saw the other players cards, out of pure respect, I would say “Fair enough. I did say call so here’s my money.” I still stand by my previous statement. There is no way someone is going to fold A-5 when the flop is 5-5-3 and their in for almost half their money already.
Opinions…?

Robert’s Rules says a call out of turn can be considered binding if there is no intervening bet or raise. But I’d acquiecse to whatever Linda ruled.

RGP’r, Irish Mike, is taking over Gary Carsons role as resident crank in rgp since Gary ain’t posting much.

“Opinions…?”

You’re a foolish, amateur mistake. Suck it up and learn from your stupidity.

Irish Mike

Geez, Mike, how are people gonna learn if they don’t ask questions? Lighten the fuck up.

I love this faux pas by wanna-be poker blogger, Phil Helmuth. Sweet, sweet Phil. He never fails to make me laugh when I’m down. If there’s ONE guy we want to win the Main Event - it’s clearly him. He’d be great on mainstream TV and it would be fantastic to watch his ego spiral out of control, if there’s room for that, anyway.

Anymore, getting irked at Phil for being a tard is like getting mad at a Smurf for being blue.

rec.gambling.poker.com - WTG Phil

Been listening to Phil’s audiobook (play poker like the pros) and in it he promotes rec.gambling.poker.com …
he repeated it about 5 times being sure to include the..com each time he said it. For the hell of it I decided to see what would come up (expected website not found) and was brought to poker.com’s landing page!
Way to go Phil! Thought you were strictly UB, but you’re sending your listeners straight to a competitor’s site Bwahahaha!

Here’s my favorite off-topic post in awhile:

OT: A dog story. You can’t make this stuff up.

Almost two months ago we had to put our 16 year-old dog (Golden Retriever mix) down after he suffered his 2nd stroke, which was quite severe. Being life-long dog owners my wife and I were quick to feel that the house needed another dog in it to be complete, so we began
looking for another to adopt. We considered many animals at various shelters and rescue agencies, but one in particular caught my eye.

I’ve always wanted a German Shepherd and was perusing the animals being offered by a rescue organization that specialized in the breed. Most of the dogs listed were in the six-month to one-year age range. This all combined to offered the trifold benefit of giving a sheltered dog a home, starting off with a dog that was already housetrained as well as
adopting for a fraction of the cost ($200) of what a breeder would charge for a pure-bred animal.

One particularly good looking female caught our eye and, once we read the description that accompanied her photos I knew this was the dog we *had* to have. The description began with an aknowledgement that the rescue volunteers had now heard every excuse there was for dumping a dog….

It seems that our new dog lived with her original owners for just over 13 months, at which point they had to move out of state and, for whatever reason, could not take her with them. They arranged to leave her with the rescue organization who would then adopt her out. She was adopted within two days after that and went home with her new family.
The first night one of the family members had a nightmare and woke up screaming. When the father woke up to the sounds of the screams he was in a cold sweat. The two remaining members of the family then claimed to be experiencing hallucinations.

The father then called the local police, asking that officers be dispatched to come and retrieve the dog because he had concluded that, “She’s doing voodoo on [them].”

After they stopped laughing (I presume) the police informed the caller that he would have to contact Animal Control for their hexing dog problem.
The dad did so, and the dog was removed to the local shelter, who then contacted the same rescue organization, who came and picked her up. We suspect the family had some bad clam strips at Long John Silver’s earlier in the day.

Like I said…once I read that we just had to have her. How can you pass up a genuine voodoo-practicing canine?

We brought her home last night and, so far, no supernatural phenomenon have been reported by anyone in my house. But just in case, we’re keeping all toenail clippings, locks of hair, dolls and push-pins away from her.

You can’t be too careful.

As someone who is an animal rescue guy (my wife runs a small non-profit) I just love that freaking story.

It’s a serious illness that I can’t resist posting these nuts. I almost think there’s someone on RGP composing these over the past three years just laughing as I post them. I only wish this was true.

That’s My Poker Stars!

I’m not sure which strange, paralel dimension it is that all of you Poker Stars raving fans live in… Perhaps it’s the one in which thesuck out is the norm, not the oddity for winning at the game of poker.

I just busted out of one of the 180 sngs at 33, having been bouncing around the top four in chips for some time. How’d I bust out? Typical Poker Stars fashion. KK vs. AJ, all in, preflop. Flop brings a jack and I wonder “will it be another jack or an ace?” Turn is anace.

Next hand I play, JJ in the small blind, min-raise from the button, I move all in, button insta-calls with AK off suit. K is a spade, as is one of my jacks and two spades hit the flop. “Will it be an ace, a king or running spades?” I ask myself. A spade on the turn makes me
say, out loud, “Running spades it is.” River is, of course, a spade.

Final hand, now a short stack, K7 suited in the BB. UTG min-raises, all fold, I call since I’m in for half and it’s an easy release. Flop comes with a K, a 7 and a 9. I check, UTG bets 1000, I move all in, UTG insta-calls with K and a 10 kicker. I wonder of all the possibilities and laugh my ass off as the board pairs that nine on the river, turning my two pair, K and 7 vs. a pair of kings into two pairK and 9, 10 kicker vs. two pair K and 9, 7 kicker.

Sure, I know, it’s poker. These things happen. However if, in real life, I took these kind of beatings EVERY TIME I PLAYED, which is the case at Poker Stars, I would have stopped playing poker when I startedtwenty-plus years ago.

People have talked of it, I think I’m going to actually do it. I think I’m going to point a video camera at the screen and make predictions for how the bad beat will unfold. I’m pretty damn
accurate at calling it. It’s down right sickening how easily predictable it is but, deny it all you want, this is how Poker Stars works.

It’s disgusting but I go into every hand I’m dominating, knowing that, based on my personal stats, what ever absurd cards need to fall to beat me WILL DEFINITELY FALL if they were not already dealt in theinnitial 18 pocket cards.

It’s not just my hands, I watch them all and the hand that’s behind, going all in, draws its win at an absolutely absurdly unrealisticrate.

I’m just trying to figure out if it’s only happening at my tables, in some massive attempt to fuck with my head, or if all the raving fans of Poker Stars are really that blind - or the most likely case - the raving fans of Poker Stars are horrid players and they think they are
playing fine, blissfully unaware that the software is propping them up.

Oh, well, let the RGP asshole contingency rip me to shreads, recommend the tin-foil hat and explain that I must just suck at poker. I know one thing, I’ve been playing for twenty-plus years. There is one place I’ve played and consistantly lost vs consistantly winning at all
the others: Poker Stars. Just once I want to lose because I did something stupid. Hasn’t happened yet.

The only time I crack the money on Stars tourneys is when I’ve got decent players laying down to me and scooping pots without showing down. Give me a table with donks that will call off their stack on junk like Q 10 off suit and I’m toast. (That’s how I busted out of
the 3:15 AM tourney, pocket nines in the BB, raised by Q 10 off suit, I move all in, Q 10 insta-calls and the requisite 10 falls on the flop.)

Watching the cards fall at Poker Stars has got to be the closest thing modern humans will ever come to what it must have been like to witnessJesus Christ in action: One miracle after another.

Foxtrot

Shiny side out, Foxtrot. Shiny side out.

Funny, but even though I’m adrift without my poker home, I’m slowly realizing that PokerStars is my favorite place to play. I’m still spending quality time on Full Tilt, mind you, but I’ve been on Stars since beta so it feels like rediscovering an old friend.

And so, let’s pimp some PokerStars! This post from RGP is a little old but you get the idea.

PokerStars Great Tournament Schedule Getting Sicker and Sicker

Starting Monday, Pokerstars is implementing a new tournament schedules
that could probably cost me $500 a day during my two week vacation even
though I never play higher than $20+$2.

They are now running tournaments every hour in this manner:
:00 – Hold’em Variations
:15– “Unique Tournaments” – Heads Up, 6-Max, and Capped Entry tournaments.
:30 – Omaha Variations
:45 – Stud Variations and HORSE

One of my favorite new tournaments is the 64 player heads-up matches (6
rounds). The reason I like it so much is because it is WINNER TAKE ALL!
Imagine winning five matches and losing the sixth. That is so sick I must
spend $5.50 to play.

And if that wasn’t good enough, check out this schedule for Monday (11/13)
alone: (Sorry in advance for the length, but I wanted to show you how many
different ways I can lose money.)

00:15 - $5.50 NL Hold’em (360 player max [up from 300])
00:30 - $5.50 PL Omaha w/ Rebuys
01:30 - $5.50 Limit Omaha w/ Rebuys
01:45 - $5.50 Razz
02:30 - $11.00 PL Omaha
03:00 - $11.00 NL Hold’em
03:30 - $5.50 Limit Omaha
03:45 - $11.00 HORSE
04:05 - $3 Rebuy Sat to Sunday Million
04:45 - $8.80 Razz
05:30 - $5.50 PL Omaha H/L
07:00 - $11.00 NL Hold’em
07:30 - $4.40 Limit Omaha H/L
08:30 - $8.80 PL Omaha
09:00 - $5.50 NL Hold’em
09:45 - $16.50 HORSE
10:00 - $8.80 NL Hold’em w/ Rebuys
12:30 - $16.50 Limit Omaha
13:00 - $5.50 NL Hold’em
13:05 - $3 Rebuy Sat to Sunday Million
13:15 - $11.00 Limit Hold’em (6 Max)
13:30 - $5.50 PL Omaha H/L w/ Rebuys
14:00 - $3.30 NL Hold’em w/ Rebuys ($10,000 Guarantee)
14:15 - $22.00 NL Hold’em Heads-up Matches (128 player max)
14:30 - $11.00 PL Omaha
14:45 - $5.50 Stud
15:00 - $5.50 NL Hold’em Turbo
15:15 - $11.00 NL Hold’em (10 Minute Levels)
15:15 - $5.50 NL Hold’em Heads-up Matches (64 player max - winner take all)
15:30 - $8.80 PL Omaha (360 player max [up from 300])
16:00 - $8.80 NL Hold’em
16:45 - $11.00 Razz
17:15 - $3 Rebuy Turbo Sat to Nightly $150+$12
17:15 - $16.50 NL Hold’em (360 player max [up from 300])
17:45 - $11.00 Stud H/L
18:00 - $5.50 NL Hold’em w/ Rebuys ($25,000 Guarantee)
18:15 - $22.00 PL Omaha H/L Deep Stack
18:45 - $11.00 HORSE (10 minute levels)
19:00 - $11.00 NL Hold’em
19:15 - $7.70 PL Hold’em (360 player max [up from 300])
19:45 - $11.00 Razz
20:00 - $3.30 NL Hold’em w/ Rebuys ($20,000 Guarantee)
20:15 - $8.80 PL Omaha H/L (360 player max [up from 300])
20:35 - $11.00 NL Hold’em sat to Sunday Million
21:00 - $4.40 Limit Hold’em
21:15 - $9.90 NL Hold’em (360 player max [up from 300])
21:30 - $5.50 PL Omaha H/L
22:00 - $16.50 NL Hold’em
23:15 - $11.00 NL Hold’em (6 Max)

So many different ways to lose money, so little time.

This is a month old but I lost in my notes. Still worthy of posting because the case is in court. I found it at Entertainment Law Digest but a subscription is needed.

Did Brian Koppelman and David Levien write ROUNDERS? Article from MSNBC:
Million Dollar Ideas Often Stolen in Hollywood

“It’s like having your soul ripped out,” says 37-year-old Cleveland resident Jeff Grosso, who paid his way through film school by playing Texas Hold ‘Em, wrote a screenplay about it, then sued Miramax over itspoker movie “Rounders.”

Wayno, who I’ve never known to be wrong, stated the following on RGP in response to the above article.

Brian Koppelman told me that he and David Levien wrote Rounders, and created the lines in the film, after which Kevin Canty adapted the screenplay into a novel, once the film was done. I believe Brian. A couple of poker players wandering around NY– just as a general plot idea– doesn’t seem copyright protectable, or whatever the phrase is.

–Wayno

Lying, cheating bastards in Hollywood. Hate em. But Gawdamnit, can I get another season of Entourage, please? I’m dying over here.

I found this classic gem in RGP - Barry Greenstein calling out Daniel Negreanu. That’s why I’m here blogging away for you - to pass along these gems.

Daniel,

Winning tournaments is all about beating up on bad players. Your record shows you are good at it. I would expect you to crossbook me even. (I would lay you odds in stud and lowball.)

In a high-limit side game you could get odds because I don’t think you are experienced enough yet. I know it is out of you range, so you may need some backers, but any time you want to crossbook with me in the big game (usually 4000 and 8000 with Chip Doyle, Phil Ivey, Chau, et. al.) you can get 6 to 5. Move down to the next level (2,000 - 4000 with the Bellagio crew) you only warrant 11 to 10.

I always get a kick out of tournament players mascarading as high-limit players.

Barry

Here’s about as strange a segue as I can make here at Guinness and Poker Poker Works. Um, an acid trip report on 2+2 - and not a good one, either.
My craziest drug experience.

Strange thread. Allow me to pull a snippet out for your edification.
Here’s a question and answer from the original poster:

I know what it sounds like, but for my own edification, can you detail what a psychological rebirth entails from what you have read.

The ego is a construct of the mind where the sense of self is located. This part of the mind is highly concerned with the individual’s safety and well being, so if something threatens that, the part of the mind that reacts is the ego.

From wikipedia: “Although in his early writings Freud equated the ego with the sense of self, he later began to portray it more as a set of psychic functions such as reality-testing, defence, synthesis ofinformation, intellectual functioning, and memory.”

When your sense of reality begins to break down your ego is assaulted. The ego is not a necessary facet of your mind, but that part of your thoughts is certainly self preserving. So if you are in a situation where it begins to decompose it will cause experiences in your body not unlike death or a sickness. My girlfriend told me later that she felt as if she was going to die during some points of the day. Obviously she was not in any physical danger, but her mind was creating these feelings nonetheless to protect the ego.

The process of eliminating the ego (ego death), can be likened to a spiritual or religious experience. Its interpretation depends on your interpretation of psychology, and can range from the Buddhist enlightenment to a mental rebirth born from reliving repressed memories of the actual birth process and finally being able to resolve the transpersonal issues descended from the physical birthing process.

Regardless of the meaning, the outcome is that through (re)experiencing the formative mental trauma of our lives and transcending it, we are able to live a more selfless, satisfied, and fulfilled life.

This explanation is hardly adequate and comes from someone who is not an expert in the field, but I hope it’s enough to satisfy your curiosity and encourage you to do further reading if you are so inclined.

I guess I never expected to be reading discussions like this whilst reading poker forums.

But hell, who hasn’t stared into the Unblinking Eye once or twice in their youth? Or maybe even last weekend?

Meaningless gambling factoid: Did you know the oldest known playing card, from China, dates from the eleventh century?

In honour of our gathering, allow me to post this overdue and long BARGE trip report from RGP regular, Fellnight. He showed up for a blogger Vegas tourney not that long ago, incidentally, with Tanya. So enjoy the read and don’t miss the hand that put Phil Gordon on tilt for an hour.

BARGE Trip Report (long)
Sorry for the delay on this report, but it has been a long time in travelling and getting settled in, ready to play professionally.

So I was in Vegas from the 9th-14th for the ITH (Internet Texas Holdem) convention. That was fun, even though I did not manage a cash in any onthe 4 events.

BARGE started on the 15th with an 8 p.m. Lazy Pineapple tourney (holdem where you are dealt 3 cards, do not discard, and may use 0, 1, or 2 cardsfrom your hand to make the best 5 card hand).

We started with 2000 chips and 50/100 limits. I do not recall very many hands, just a couple of wrap straight draws and overplayed 2 pair handsthat led to my quick demise (~75/80)

After that, I played in a 6/12 mix game at the Venetian (Stud, O8, Crazy Pineapple8 and Razz), and lost about $50 over a 2 hour period. As usual, Razz was my nemesis. I recall starting with 5 hands in the first razzorbit 7 or lower and winning none of them.

It was about 1 a.m. and I called it an early night, crawling into bed before the lobah tourney the next day.

The next event was not until 7 p.m, as the blackjack and video poker events had been cancelled, and we had the non-smokers dinner at 9ine at the Palms at 5 p.m. Met a bunch of great people, shared a nice bottle ofwine, and generally ate far too much

It was my first time playing draw lowball, and I sucked. Didn’t help that I bricked every draw but one, and again I went out early. Tanya and a bunch of virgins went out to the IP to Kareoke, and I passed, not being a kareoke person myself. They did, apparently, have a good time though, and I would not miss it in the future, given the great times that were to comeat BARGE.

Thursday morning was the Team CHORSE event, and I played Stud for the team. We played 3 rounds of the event, I managed to book a profit for the team in each and every stud round, but unfortunately our team lost abouthalf our buyin (each chip had cash value).

There was some time before the evening’s stud shootout event, so I played a 3/6 holdem and 3/6 HORSE game most of the day (with other BARGErs of course). I got my ass handed to me in Holdem, and destroyed the HORSEgame, so it was a wash.

The stud shootout event was quite fun. I was sitting at a table with Howard Beale (not his real name), and Jerrod Ankenman. I took an early chiplead when I was dealt rolled up 6s and Jerrod had Aces which becameAces up.

I felt that I played a good game, and got 3 handed with a shared chiplead against Howard Beale and an unknown, but very aggressive player.

Howard was knocked out quickly by my opponent, and we got headsup, where I went completely card dead and draw dead, and went out very shortlyafterward against a well disguised and well played big pair.

After this, Super Steamer and I went up to Elg26’s room and played some of our heads-up matches as planned. He was a worthy adversary, and defeated me soundly in the first O8 HU match, then we quit shortly into the second match with him at a 2:1 chiplead as Tanya called to ask us to railbird her
at the final table of the evening $200 buyin tourney at the Venetian. We railbirded for over an hour before there was a bustout. It was the longest final table, with the most play, that I have ever seen at a
non-major event. Tanya, unfortunately, busted in 8th.

We hit the sack, and showed up a little red-eyed for the next day’s TOC-style event (Limit Holdem, Limit Omaha8, Limit Stud). I felt great, and quickly amassed the table chiplead. Again, Stud was my bread and
butter, but Omaha8 was kind to me as well. After about 7 levels, there were less than a quarter of the field left, and I still had the table chiplead. I got a maniacal opponent all-in with QQ against his A4o for 5
bets preflop, but he spiked the Ace to beat me. Then, I raised with JJ, he reraised, and I called. The flop came J32, I bet, he raised, I called. The turn 5. I checked, he bet, I raised, he reraised, I rereraised, and
he called. At this point I was sure that I was ahaead, either against another set or against an overpair to the board. The river was a harmless 8, I bet, and he called, showing me A4 again, like a punch to the gut.

I was now down to a tiny stack, and was all-in with A9s and missed, busting from the table chiplead to out in 4 hands flat.

After this was the Symposium/Calcutta auction. I was paired with Tanya, and we sold for $150, which was a good price. We bought about $500 worth of other players, but only one of our horses cashed in the Main Event, sowe took a loss of around $300.

Super Steamer was among the chipleaders as the TOC resumed, and the rest of us went downtown for the Craps Crawl and BARGE wedding of Chris and Amy. Craps is a lot of fun when playing with a bunch of gambooolers, I will tell you that. That dealers sure earned their pay on this night. After the crawl, we went to the Fitzgerald, where the wedding and kareoke was to take place. This was probably the most fun I have ever had at a party. All the BARGErs were doing personal renditions of favourite love (and anti-love) songs for Chris and Amy. The virgins of BARGE (myself included), sang a heartfelt rendition of “Like a Virgin”. The wedding itself was beautiful, with Patti Beadles as judicator, but then came theparty afterward!

Sl1mder kicked it off with an incredible rendition of “Rapper’s delight”. He had the entire room bouncing. The ADBers sang “One bourbon, one scotch, one beer”, and then there were several other very funny performances of some oldie-but-goodies, before Tanya and Sl1mder took the stage for “Baby got back”. This was the performance of the year, IMHO. Sl1mder can do wonders with the microphone, and Tanya danced along with the song, which made for one of the best performances ever. Major props to both of you!

Around this time, Super Steamer showed up, with his 1st place trophy in hand, and we were all very excited and proud for him.

Management finally gave us the boot around 3 a.m. and I went back and slept like a log.

In the morning, I showed up in time for the NLHE main event. I am seated at a good table, with Phil Gordon 2 seats to my left, and Chris in Texas 2seats to my right.

Early on, I get into a pot with Phil, which he remembers vividly. The blinds were 25/50, and he and I both had stacks about 3000 deep. I raised to 150 in the CO-1 with T7o, and he called on the button (as he had been apt to do with many hands), trying to take pots away on the flop. The flop comes Q87 rainbow. Instantly, I knew that this was the type of flop that Phil would expect me to have missed, and so I started staring at the flop, giving out the reverse Tell I expected him to pick up on where a player who misses the flop and is weak. I bet 150, still staring at the flop. As I expected, he raised me to 400. I called. The turn was a 5. I checked, and Phil carefully checked behind. The river was a 3, and I checked again, knowing that my hand was probably good, but not enough to bet. He checked, and couldnt believe that I had called him with 3rd pairno kicker.

A few hands later, I got KK against Chris in Texas’s EP raise. He made it 1200, and I moved all-in (he had only 900 or so behind, and I knew that he had a strong hand to raise with in EP). He called, showing QQ, and myKings held up to win.

I lasted another 3 or 4 levels, getting my money in with the best hand every time but once (when I had AJ against a shortstack’s slowplayed AK on the Axx flop), but could not get my hands to hold up, and I busted abouthalfway in.

One hand of interest was a hand that put Phil Gordon on mega-tilt. The action was as follows:

Phil raised to 400 (blinds 50/100) in EP with his huge stack of 10k chips. He was called on the button by the other big stack of 6500. The BB moved allin for 1000 more. Phil and the other big stack both called. The flop came 7s4s4h. Phil checked. His opponent bet 1500. Phil checkraised all-in, and was quickly called. I was astounded to see 6s5s for Phil (justifiable play), and 8c7c for the other big stack (wow!!!). The BB, of course, had the overpair of TT. The turn and river were bricks, and 8c7c won a massive sidepot. Phil went off on him, saying that it was the worst call he had ever seen, that he makes that checkraise with any hand that beats sevens with an 8 kicker… when his opponent said “or 6 high.” Phillost it, and was tilting for the next hour.

That evening was the banquet, and Phil was the guest speaker. His presentation was hilarious, and was an analysis on how to become (andstay) and overrated poker player).

After the banquet was “crazy games night”. I played in the 3/6 Must-Drink mix game. That was an experience. It started off fairly tight, until the entire world went on tilt. There was one memorable hand that must be shared. Pots were being blind-capped, and called around. On one Omaha8 pot, the pot was being played blind by half the table. capped preflop ($15*9), capped on the flop, ($15*9), capped on the turn ($30*9), andcapped on the river ($30*9), creating an over $700 pot at 3/6!

The flop was A7J, turn 4, and river was another 7. A blind player finally turned over her cards to find AAxx, for a huge score (and 25xx won thelow).

That was fun.

So I’m cruising around, and Patti asks me if I finally understand BARGE. I said that it took a while, but I think I finally do (not at all what Ihad expected). I could use another drink though…

Patti hands me a full brandy snifter. I have no idea what is in it, but I decide to chug it. Patti’s eyes bug out as she watches me down about 6 shots of scotch. I don’t feel so good anymore. I feel like I’m gonna
hurl all over a nice poker table, but manage to hold it down. Wow. Never again.

I decide it would be good to leave, so I bid farewell to the BARGErs, promising to return next year.

This is a must-experience for anyone. Seriously.

Fell

Pretty good trip report. Not nearly as wacky as the one ending this post, but hey, it’s hard to compete with Mr. Coleman when he’s not frothing at the mouth over politics.

Aw hell, I feel bad ending this uber because I’m heading off to Vegas Thursday night and this is gonna have to hold you over until I return. So let’s go the extra copy/paste mile and give you some arguably interesting fodder.

For one, I’m finally remembering to post Fast Eddie’s 10 monitor setup for online poker. Here you go:

In my pursuit of any poker game not named Texas Hold Em, I’m including this Crazy Russ GCA post about Low Ball Draw. I’m pretty sure this is only the second time in over three years of countless uber posts that I’ve ever posted anything from this nutjob.
But because what I know about LowBall could fit into a thimble, I’m posting Russ’s RGP post on the game. This is almost more for me than anyone else, but if you’re interested in learning a new game, give this a read.

Low Ball DrawMany players are new to the game these days and don’t know the history of poker. For decades Draw Low Ball and Stud dominated the poker scene with betting variations such as Limit, Pot Limit or No Limit. It’s only since this century began that NL Hold’em has commanded such a greatpresence.

Normally the games worked to compensate both the house and the professional players who were liked unpaid props and good for forty plus hours a week. We’ll address that issue later on, meanwhile, on toLimit Draw Lowball.

Rules get changed in games all the time. Seldom if ever are they done to help the professional player. Rather, they are made to increase revenue for the house under the pretext of protecting the players.

While Low Ball’s best days have gone, it’s still played on a small scale in casinos and in mixed games. They also have tourneys of thisgame in different variations such as Limit Ace-5 and No Limit 2-7.

While many might consider it a slow and boring game by today’s standards A-5 was a MAIN GAME for decades in the poker world. Today it’s a third class game at best. Rules have changed. In decades gone by, it was played with unlimited raises. Today, it’s played with threeraises, which helps the weaker players.

The basic premise of this game is the lowest five cards win, provided there are no pairs. Aces are considered the lowest card and flushes and straights don’t apply. In most cash games a joker is used and is considered to be a filler. It can’t be paired and is used as the lowest
card in your hand that doesn’t pair any other. Thus, it’s a pretty big edge to have this card.

The best hand in A-5 lowball is A, 2, 3, 4, 5. Any four cards with the joker also equals this, so you can see the joker will double your edge if you’re drawing to the best hand. EXAMPLE: Ace, 2,3,4 draw without joker only allows for a five to make the best hand. This means 4 cards make a ‘wheel’, a nickname for the ‘nuts’ or the best possible hand in the game. Substitute the joker for one of these cards in your draw as in Ace, 2,3, Joker and you’ll see that any four or five will makeyour ‘NUT HAND’.

Provided you don’t have to raise to enter, one of the strongest plays in this game is a move called ‘gypsying,’ meaning if you come in, you just call. Since we’re talking primarily about full games, opening hands should be at least a smooth 1 card draw to a 7 in early positions. In late positions, provided no one has called, draws to smooth 8’s are allowed. Two card draws are out of the question, even with the joker - except in certain situations which I’ll address
later.

Lowball is a game of position like all draw and flop games. ‘Gypsying’ in helps nullify position if you’re in early position and allows you to bluff in late positions far easier as the adequate
value is not there for a call.

First, while ‘gypsying’ was a major weapon of days of long ago, many petitioned for its elimination as it slowed the action. However, the name of the game is making money, so this type of playing allows for agreat style if approached in a proper manner.

You’ll have to check the rules to see if you can ‘gypsy’. In Hold’em, ‘gypsying’ would be limping in. Imagine they allow this in some games (calling when entering the pot) instead of raising. What if they maderaising mandatory in Hold’em?

The strategy of ‘gypsying’ is a concept of trapping the blinds for multiple bets, yet minimizing your position should you limp in and be raised and have all fold to you. It’s all mathematics, allowing theplay of the hand to dictate the odds favorite depending upon the play.

This theory goes as follows, as you limp in early position, you expect a decent hand to raise in later positions. Provided this happens and the blinds call, you three bet to extract maximum value. I have stated the minimum to gypsy in with, or call with. You’d do the same thing ifyou held a ‘wheel’ or close.

If you’re raised from behind and all fold to you, just call unless you have a pat hand of an 8 or better. Often, you may think that the correct play is to just call with an 8 and stand pat, hoping the opposition may have a pat (made 9) 9. This puts him into a dilemma, as it’s hard for him to put you on a pat 8, since you just called when opening and just called the raise heads-up. It’s better to freeze the action have a ‘cinch’ when he doesn’t draw to a smooth 9, opposed towhen he breaks the smooth 9 and draws for a win.

Either way, you check and call if the pot is bet after the draw. The reason is that you have disguised your hand and made it look far weaker than it is. Thus, opponents will try to steal often enough for you tomake a profit.

When you ‘gypsy=limp’ and are raised from late positions and have the blinds call, you can then evaluate your hand value and raise if you like. Any smooth 9 or 8 is a reraising hand when others have entered the pot. If alone try calling and then checking after the draw. Often players will try ’snowing’ you - this means they have NOTHING and are making a move on you. This is one of the positives to this style,especially with players who don’t know you.

When in the big blind use this basic rule. No two card draws unless you have two or more players in the pot. Exceptions can be if your hand contains the joker. This game requires you to bet a 7 or better after the draw, so if you did isolate the blind with a ‘gypsy,’ you can value bet 8-10s, even J’s at times. Check Q-K and small pairs, as betting in these situations are usually losing plays. Bet with all big pairs 4,4-7,7 as it’s not that easy to call a pot with a minimum amount inwith a pair.

You gain an image of being a tight player, and this allows you to steal. Players in early positions are forced to bet a 7 or better or not win any chips after the draw. Thus, you’ve eliminated many hands if they have checked. By value betting your 9’s, 10’s and often J’s, you will force the opposition to fold small pairs and K’s and Q’s when in for a minimum bet.

Geepers, that was a nightmare to format. And if he had used the word ‘gypsying’ one more fucking time, my head was going to explode.

This RGP political post is just too damn funny not to share. It’s far too good to be an original RGP concoction but I say kudos all the same.

Enjoy:

OT: as usual, the republicans were right

now that we, the democrats, have retaken power in congress, it is time to reveal our true agenda. once we retake the white house in 2008, the following 25 point will be just the tip of the iceberg.

here’s our plan:

1. Mandatory homosexuality
2. Drug-filled condoms in schools
3. Introduce the new Destruction of Marriage Act
4. Border fence replaced with free shuttle buses
5. Osama Bin Laden to be Secretary of State
6. Withdraw from Iraq, apologize, reinstate Hussein
7. English language banned from all Federal buildings
8. Math classes replaced by encounter groups
9. All taxes to be tripled
10. All fortunes over $250,000 to be confiscated
11. On-demand welfare
12. Tofurkey to be named official Thanksgiving dish
13. Freeways to be removed, replaced with light rail systems
14. Pledge of Allegiance in schools replaced with morning flag-burning
15. Stem cells allowed to be harvested from any child under the age of 8
16. Comatose people to be ground up and fed to poor
17. Quarterly mandatory abortion
18. God to be mocked roundly
19. Dissolve Executive Branch: reassign responsibilities to UN
20. Jane Fonda to be appointed Secretary of Appeasement
21. Outlaw all firearms: previous owners assigned to anger management therapy
22. Texas returned to Mexico
23. Ban Christmas: replace with Celebrate our Monkey Ancestors Day
24. Carter added to Mount Rushmore
25. Modify USA’s motto to “Land of the French and the home of the brave”

Finally, some great news for funding online poker accounts. PokerStars now has ePassporte as a deposit option. I’d love to see some more positive news like this. We need it.

Whew. I’m tapped out and hoping someone, anyone, read this far. I truly am deranged.

Now click on some banners here at Pokerworks and sign up with a new damn poker room. Seriously, support your insane poker bloggers. I do this for you, after all.

Gypsying.

I’m finishing this uber post up with yet another sparkling gem from the RGP-Uber-Troll-to-end-all-Uber-Trolls, William Coleman. Actually, sparkling gem prolly isn’t the proper descriptive. At all. See, I’m not a strip club guy so I suppose I’m just doing my best Jane Goodall impression of reading reports from a veteran titty bar addict and passing them along to my superiors who want this type of missive. So . . .enjoy this Strip Club manifesto. (and sorry for any formatting issues - i’m still learning my way around here)

See everyone in Vegas! Thanks for reading.
——————–

Subject: On the road with Ramashiva in Las Vegas

I know you guys are pissed because I haven’t been sharing any of my titty bar experiences with you, so here you have a mixed titty bar and poker room review. That is why there is no OT prefix. There is actually some pokercontent in this post.

From the thread “OT: Roommates wanted”, in case you missed it –

“Douglas Dunn” wrote in message
news:1163055478.266999.252440@h48g2000cwc.googlegroups.com…
:
: pokerchimp wrote:
: > actually, i once dated a vegetarian lesbian stripper…60 pounds

LMFAO!!! When I read this, I thought Jewish American Lesbian was saying that the fucking stripper weighed 60 pounds!

OMFG! ROFLMAO! That would be the ultimate skinny little broad with no tits, which, as you all know, is my ultimate fantasy love/sex body type.

Speaking of skinny little broads with no tits, I saw one yesterday on day shift at Crazy Horse Too, which is on Industrial just north of the Sahara overpass. Her name is Lisa. Lisa is a cocktail waitress training to be a stripper. Probably 5′ 6″, 80 pounds, and could pass for a man in the tit department. This girl was anorexic, to say the least. Pretty face, butdrawn and emaciated.

Speaking of the Crazy Horse Too, it has been reborn, after losing its liquor license a few weeks (months?) ago. I experienced considerable schadenfreude when this happened, since I was rudely booted out of the club in 2001, after practically living there for several years. This was because some fucking stripper decided I was rude to her because I talked to her earlier, thendecided to get lap dances from another girl, which I also regret.

This is one thing you have to be very careful about when hanging out in strip clubs. It is very easy to get tossed out of strip clubs, especially if you are outrageous like me, or even if you’re not. I have been tossed out of three strip clubs — Olympic Garden, 1998 — Crazy Horse Too, 2001 — and Cheetahs, 2006. The Cheetahs incident happened several months ago, and it involved a stripper simply lying to the bouncers because she thought Iwas rude to her.

So try to be super polite to everyone — the strippers, the cocktail waitresses, the bouncers — especially the bouncers. It never hurts to tip the bouncers $20 once in awhile. They especially like to get green andblack checks from nearby casinos.

Speaking of Crazy Horse Too, this is as good a time as any to give you a comprehensive review, since this marked a grand homecoming for me to whathas always been my favorite strip club in Las Vegas or anywhere else.

But let me begin at the beginning, but of course I couldn’t do that, because I could easily write a series of thousand page novels on my experiences the last two months or so since I have been on the road. I have been back in Las Vegas for what, two weeks? But it’s still like being on the road. I have been sleeping on my couch for two weeks because I tossed out my old mattress, expecting the delivery of a new extra firm Sealy Posturpedic Queen mattress from J.C. Penney. I ordered it a month ago, and I just found out yesterday it’s still in a warehouse up in Reno. They told me delivery wouldbe three weeks or or so, but still.

Anyway, I realized last Saturday that I am now addicted to or dependent on Ramashiva’s Secret Formula — Camel Turkish Gold 100s, Diet Coke, and Red Bull. I had a great Sabbath at the Seventh Day Adventist Church in Boulder City — Sabbath Bible Study at 9:30, Worship Service at 11, followed by Sabbath potluck dinner. Sometimes the conversations at these potlucks go on for hours, and I got involved in one of these with several of the smarter guys at this church. One of them is a chiropracter named Jamie, and he seriously thinks I am doing long term damage to my health by going on thesetwo and three day runs with no sleep fueled by Ramashiva’s Secret Formula.

Chasened by Jamie, I finally left the Church about 5 pm; and I decided to go the rest of the day without Diet Coke and Red Bull. I was well rested that day when I went to Church, and had consumed a couple of Diet Coke/RedBull/Orange Juice concoctions on the drive to Boulder City.

I have been so consumed by horniness and hustling women that I haven’t been playing a lot of poker. Some, but not nearly enough to cover the approximately $4000 in travel expenses and $4000 in titty bar expenses I have racked up the last couple of months. I have been trying to get into playing at Binion’s, since they seem to be the last place in town with a 5% rake, at least with a structured $4/$8 game, which is my preferred livegame.

So I went downtown, and they had a good $4/$8 game. I started ordering extra spicy Virgin Marys and bottles of water, instead of Diet Coke and limes. They have no Red Bull or other energy drinks at Binion’s. Shame onthem.

By midnight, I was winning about $60 and running out of steam, so I went downstairs and ordered two of the 99 cent breakfast specials (no meat). I figured a big shot of protein and a couple of cigarettes (Yes, you can still smoke in Binion’s coffee shop) would revive me. But no. I went back and tried to play, but I was so fatigued that I couldn’t even keep my eyes open. When I am well rested and wound up on Red Bull and Diet Coke, I can stay upall night and well into the next day without feeling any fatigue whatsoever.

So I went home that night realizing I had an addiction problem. The next couple of days, through election day, I went cold turkey. Well, I still smoked a few cigarettes. The result was I basically slept on my couch fortwo days, except to wake up once in a while to eat and smoke a joint.

Wednesday, I realized I had to do something, so Wednesday afternoon I made my standard Costco run — case of Diet Coke, case of Red Bull, big bag of limes, big bag of oranges. I then drove out to Boulder City for Wednesday night Bible Study, fueling up on Diet Coke and Red Bull on the way. Feelinggood after Bible Study, I headed for Binion’s.

I got there around 9, and they had no $4/$8 game, only $2/$4 limit and $1/$2 no limit. I guess I will have to learn to play no limit cash games, because that seems to be where most of the action is at Binion’s these days. They frequently have $5/$10 no limit games as well.

Anyway, I hate playing in these $2/$4 games because of the 10% $4 max rake. I guess you can make a profit with supertight play against the truly mediocre opposition in these games, but why bother? One good thing about these games, when the action is six-handed or less, they make it $1 max rake. I have gotten that from three different shift supervisors, so I thinkthat is standard policy.

But I was well rested and in a good mood (Red Bull has that effect), so I figured — Fuck it. I have got to get some discipline back. I am well rested and feeling good. I am going to sit and play for at least eight hours, or as long as there is a game.

They also have regular tournaments going on at Binion’s, so the poker room is now quite large. They must have at least 30 tables, maybe more.

They even have a tournament at 2 am, which attracted enough players to fill three tables. Not bad at 2 am in the middle of the week. Anyway, there were a lot of people around, including several outrageously sexy women, but they were all locked up by husbands/boyfriends, so even a brazen Ramashivahustle was out of the question.

Needless to say, all these sexy women got my mind off poker and onto sex, but the only available women were two fat broads in the game from Michigan, who were staying up all night waiting to check into a hotel room. I briefly considered hustling them. I suppose they were fuckable. They both had pretty faces and likeable personalities. But I just didn’t feel I could puta sincere hustle on them, so I didn’t.

I went absolutely card dead in the game, and I wound up losing $28 by 5 am. The game was dominated most of the night by two obnoxious drunks who were friends and carried on a nonstop trashtalking bullshit commentary, which no one at the table found at all funny. If you try to have a conversation with anyone else at the table, they interject themselves into that conversationtoo. You know the type.

The game was still going strong at 5 am, so I went out to my car to refuel with cannabis and Red Bull. I got really fucking blasted. This pot I’m smoking right now is potent and EXTREMELY slow burning. It takes forever tosmoke a joint, which is good.

I went back into the casino, and the two fat broads were playing slots. One of them is married, so I approached the single one and asked her if the game had broken up, which of course it had. I was actually going to hustle her if I had received any friendly or horny vibes. I didn’t, so I didn’t.

Now, I am wide awake, feeling fine, stoned on my butt. What am I going to do? Go home and post on RGP for 16 straight hours? Horny as hell? I don’t think so. I went back out to my car, got two Red Bulls, and drank them with two 99 cent breakfast specials. By the way, besides being a big jolt of protein, four eggs are also a great source of lecithin, which is a great source of choline, which your body converts to acetylcholine, which is a fundamental neurotransmitter. I have found that a large dose of lecithin, either as a supplement or in food, is a great way to combat fatigue and keep mentally sharp. If you want to maximize the conversion of choline to acetylcholine, take one or more DMAE capsules and one or more good B100capsules at the same time.

Naturally, the next place I find myself is cruising Industrial Road at 6 am,

looking for an open strip club. This is when you know for sure that you are really horny, really lonely, and really desperate. When you are cruisingIndustrial Road at 6 am Thursday morning looking for an open strip club.

I drove past Crazy Horse Too and saw a bunch of cars outside, but I just kept on driving. The only other strip club I saw open was Sapphire’s, I think that’s the name. It’s in the building behind the Stardust that used to be an athletic club. There were practically no cars in the parking lot,so I headed back to Crazy Horse Too.

Even though it had been five years since my rude ejection from Crazy Horse Too, I was reluctant to go back, because this is the Mafia we are talking about here, and when they throw you out of a strip club, they threaten to doall sorts of horrible things if you ever come back.

I figured that there must have been a complete change of management, including bouncers, for them to get their liquor license back, so I decided to chance it. None of these Mafia bouncers have ever laid a hand on me, except to frisk me for weapons, when ejecting me from a club. But they havebeen extremely rude, to say the least.

So I really wasn’t too worried about getting beaten up. Naturally the club was completely dead at 6 am in the middle of the week. Naturally there was the usual complement of North Las Vegas crack whores, but there were a few decent looking white girls too, so I decided to stay. Incredibly, there was no girl dancing on stage. I immediately started complaining about this to the strippers, cocktail waitresses, and bouncers. Everyone told me the stage show would be starting shortly. For the next twelve hours, maybe twoor three girls danced on stage.

This is idiocy. Most men who go into a strip club expect to see girls dancing on stage. They expect to see naked women doing outrageous things for the price of a drink. The fucking strippers in this club are too fucking lazy to get up on stage because they think there is no business. What happens when a live one like me walks in, sees there is no stagedancing, and walks out?

I stayed because I knew a lot of the girls were in the back napping or eating. The morning shift at Crazy Horse Too is 5 am to 1 pm. Normally a major strip club located next to the strip wouldn’t be this dead, even at 6 am Thursday morning, but the place evidently just reopened, and it takes awhile for word to get around.

After awhile this decent looking blonde made up to look like Marilyn Monroe and wearing a bra decided to seduce me. I just wasn’t interested, because, while she was definitely stacked and pretty, she just didn’t fit my skinnylittle broad with no tits profile.

But this fucking stripper decided to put the full tilt stripper seduction on me. She’s sitting on my lap and starts kissing me passionately. Then she pulls out her tits and more or less forces me to suck on one of them. Then she pulls down her G-string and lets me see her pussy. Then she grabs my now erect penis through my Levis and starts stroking me vigorously. Fuck, I can’t help but get turned on, but I NEVER give into this kind of hustle. I guess she figured she made my dick stiff, so that meant I would buy lapdances for sure.

By the way, this scenario is a way you can get cheap thrills in a strip club without spending any money. A lot of these broads will go the extra mile to try to get you to buy lap dances. I have even had dancers at Cheetahs grab my hand, shove one of my fingers up their pussy, and start humping my fingerlike crazy.

The major problem is that when you finally say “no”, the girl is pissed because she gave you all the freebies. Unless the club is busy with a lot of dancers, word will quickly spread that you are just trying to get as much for free as you can. Also, these girls do get lonely, horny, and bored. Some of these girls will come and get cuddly and even get into heavymakeout/petting sessions with you, just to pass the time.

Anyway, just when I am trying to figure out how to get rid of this blonde without really pissing her off, another girl, named Cinnamon, showed up. Cinnamon, along with one other girl from day shift, is the major subject of this review. Cinnamon is 38, and claims to have been in the Army and served in Iraq. She is the classic veteran stripper — perfectly sculpted body from years of working out and doing yoga for several hours everyday. About 5′ 4″, slender, but not extremely so, with nice, well proportioned, natural, non-sagging tits. She has long curly brown hair falling down around her shoulders. Dark complexion with big soulful brown eyes. She is probably too old for most of you guys, but I immediately saw a kindness and sadness in her eyes which attracted me right away. Of course beauty is subjective,
but I would say she is very beautiful, and she wears absolutely no makeup. I know most of you guys have never seen a beautiful woman without makeup, but they don’t look glamorous without makeup, just beautiful.

Anyway, I immediately invited her to sit down. I bought both girls drinks; and I started regaling these two strippers with tales of Tiffany, my vegetarian lesbian stripper girlfriend, which I cannot tell you guys about, because Tiffany made me promise to keep my fucking mouth shut about myactivities with her, especially outside the strip club where I met her.

Cinnamon and I are a perfect match. Veteran stripper, veteran titty bar addict. The beautiful thing about Cinnamon is that all those years stripping haven’t hardened her. Or she at least puts on a very good act of being kind and loving. She even got up on stage and danced, which is what I really like. I like flirting with the girls on stage and getting tits rubbed in my face for a dollar tip. This is my preferred method of selecting a girl when I go into a new strip club. I like to take several hours to check out all the talent, both on stage and off, before spending any money on anything but drinks. If a stripper hits on me and is real attractive, I will normally invite her to sit down and have a drink. If she starts hustling lap dances right away, I immediately lose interest, unless she is REALLY hot. Sometimes you meet a stripper like Tiffany, or Cinnamon, or Silver, whom I will tell you about later, and you just know right awaythat this girl is as good as it gets.

But, for example, the first time I met Tiffany, she came off the stage after dancing, and she sat and talked with me for a solid hour without mentioning lap dancing. I brought up the subject first. This is the type of girl Ibelieve gives the highest quality titty bar experience.

To sum up — Ramashiva’s first rule of optimizing your titty bar experience — You choose the girl. Don’t let the girl choose you.

Second rule — The best way to meet and evaluate girls is to flirt with them while they are dancing on stage. You can get a lot of cheap thrills that way and see whether they really turn you on. A beautiful stripper who knows how to dance and how to seduce men should make you want to grab her and fuck
her on the spot.

While she was on stage, I verified that Cinnamon is in great shape, is a great dancer, can do all the advanced yoga poses and gymnastic maneuvers, and has NATURAL tits. I cannot stand boob jobs, especially since I likesmall tits in the first place.

Just about this time, they announced that everyone had to move to Cleopatra’s Lounge while they cleaned up the main part of the club. Cleopatra’s Lounge is REALLY dark, and there were no bouncers at all. Just the bartenders, cocktail waitress, strippers, and a few customers. The policy there is apparently that they really don’t give a fuck what the girlsdo, as long as the girl is comfortable with it.

You know, I am so jaded that a lap dance, even a really good dry fucking lap dance, doesn’t do that much for me. But I was glad to be freed of the onorous “no hands, no touching” rules I had put up with for a month at the Library, where I met Tiffany. I definitely do not recommend the Library to anyone, because they are super control freaks and seem determined to make sure no one has any fun in their club. I met some really beautiful, wonderful women there, including Tiffany, and another incredibly beautiful vegetarian lesbian stripper named Silver, who is absolutely the best stage dancer I have ever seen. Silver is also very bright and a blast to hang out with. She doesn’t hustle you at all. She doesn’t need to. The first time I met Silver, I did a few lap dances with her right before closing. The next time I came in, she sat and talked with me for three solid hours andnever once brought up the subject of lap dancing. Finally I asked her –

Are you just a conversationalist, or do you also do lap dances?

Seriously, if you want to see perfection in the female form, as well as one of the most beautiful women on the planet, go see Silver at the Library. She works swing shift. Tell her Bill, that fat, baldheaded horny fucker, sent you. Her weak point is her lap dances, which are cold and artistic, not hot and passionate. Of course, she is hobbled by the incredibly strictrules at the Library.

Anyway, back to Cinnamon. We moved to Cleopatra’s Lounge, and I still couldn’t shake the blonde. She continued to talk as if it were a forgone conclusion that she and Cinnamon would both do lap dances for me. I kept telling her “no”, but she was really insistent, so finally Cinnamon basically told me I would have to do at least one lap dance with the blonde, because she was talking to me first. I paid the blonde for one lap danceand she mercifully left.

I know you guys aren’t interested in the clinical details of lap dances with Cinnamon, so I will keep that to a minimum. Also, if any law enforcement officials ever question me about the following, I will claim that I madeeverything up and none of it ever happened.

Cinnamon strips down to nothing but a scanty thin cloth G-string under her regular G-string. You can see her pussy perfectly outlined, and she obligingly pulls back her G-string so you can see her pussy when she has it right in your face. I am pretty sure her regular customers get to lick that pussy, but I didn’t want to press my luck. I had complete, unrestricted access to her titties, including fondling, kneading, kissing, licking, sucking, etc. She even started kissing me. Teasingly at first, but then we
got into a full blown makeout session. I told her I wasn’t interested in all the acrobatic lapdancing bullshit, just face to face intimacy with dry fucking, etc. Pretty soon she was straddling me, which is strictly forbidden at the Library, riding my fully erect cock with nothing on but that thin little G-string, while kissing me passionately, letting me play with her tits, ass, or whatever else I wanted to grab. That’s pretty much the way it went for the next five hours, even when I was not paying for lap
dances.

I imagine the other strippers, who were hanging out at a table and at the bar, were thinking –

What the fuck are they doing? She is not even doing lap dances. They are just dry fucking each others brains out and making out like a couple ofteenagers.

In other words, great lap dances. The only problem is that she has the annoying habit of breaking out laughing at the most passionate moments. Also, she is a walking music encyclopedia. Every song that comes on, sheknows the artist, the band members, who else has covered the song, etc.

I started lap dances with her about 8, and we continued until she got off at 1. I first bought two sets of three dances at $60/set. Then, when I saw how much fun I was having, I negotiated bulk purchases of 6 dances for $100, and I spent another $200 that way. She wasn’t at all pushy about more lap dances, but, if you expect to have the undivided attention of a beautiful stripper like this for several hours, you have to spend some money. I spent a total of $320 on lap dances and maybe $80 on drinks. In other words,about $80/hour.

At the end of her shift, Cinnamon got back up on stage and danced for me the last 15 minutes of her shift. It was like a clinic in stage dancing for the other strippers in the club, and they all knew it. Their comments andreactions made that obvious. The girl has class.

Anyway, Cinnamon gets the Ramashiva Five Star Award as a truly outstanding Las Vegas stripper. Maybe she won’t appeal to you the way she appealed tome, but I am certain most men would find her extremely beautiful and sexy.

After five hours of being throroughly worked over by Cinnamon, I was too stimulated to sleep, especially since I was knocking back Red Bull clones with ice and lime at a pretty good pace. So I wound up staying through day shift, and left about 9 pm. I didn’t buy any more lap dances because I was just too tired and satiated to enjoy them. I did buy a few strippers drinks and flirt with a few of them on stage when they finally started having girlsdance on stage.

But the highlight of my post-Cinnamon experience was a beautiful young Puerto Rican stripper named Jayda (spelling?). After Cinnamon left, I strategically positioned myself at the corner of the stage near a row of chairs along a wall where the girls do most of their lap dances. I have to tell you, I get more turned on watching a beautiful woman doing a lap dancethan I do being the recipient. Plus, it’s free.

Jayda is young, I would guess 18 - 22, classic skinny little broad with no tits, and absolutely gorgeous. She doesn’t really look Hispanic. She has black hair, but a fair complexion.

I have to tell you that watching this girl give lap dances is the most erotic experience I have ever had in a strip club. She also danced on stage once and is a fabulous stage dancer. I watched her in operation for several hours. She sat and talked to one guy at the bar for about three hours, then took him to a chair near where I was sitting and did just three lap dances. After that, she got more active, and brought one guy after another over for lap dances. Twice I tipped her $10 when she walked by me after some lap dances. I told her that I really got off watching her and felt I should tip her. She just laughed, and she didn’t even try to hustle me for lap dances.That shows a lot of class.

Again, Five Star Award for Jayda, who is undoubtedly the Queen of day shift, at least in my book. Day shift is 1 pm to 9 pm, in case you are interested.

William Coleman (ramashiva)

——————-

OK, here’s a question from the peanut gallery with Mr. Coleman’s response:
: Hey Rama - can’t you get a little more bang for your buck being in LV and
: all? I’m not being sarcastic or anything, I’m just puzzled by the idea of
: spending so much money in strip clubs when I assume there are more
:appealing options.

–

I assume you are referring to actually getting fucked, or at least getting your cock sucked. Yes, of course that is possible. This is Las Vegas. From $20 hot wet blow jobs in a strip casino parking lot, to $2000/nighthigh class hookers, you can pretty much get whatever you want. For a price.

You can get fucked and sucked in the strip clubs with the right girl if you go to VIP. I never do that because it is very expensive, and the really beautiful strippers don’t turn tricks. They don’t need to. They make a tonof money doing lap dances.

There are also the escort services, who send a girl to your hotel room for “entertainment”. I don’t like this type of prepackaged, plastic setup. If I were going to patronize a hooker in Las Vegas, which I have never done in the 22 years I have lived here, I would pick one up in a lounge on thestrip.

Basically, all the unescorted girls in the lounges on the strip are hookers. They are a lot of fun to party and dance with, and some of them will go out to your car and get stoned with you. This is where the subject of hot, wetblowjobs comes up.

Despite being the horniest man on the planet, I have been technically celibate for 20 years. I am scared to death of AIDS, and I have become deeply religious, so that I am only willing to have sex in a marriage, or at least a committed, monogamous relationship. Even Tiffany has not been ableto get me to fuck her, although she has certainly tried.

Then there is the issue of beauty. Some of the hookers in the strip lounges are young and good looking, but you are not going to find any really beautiful women like Tiffany, Cinnamon, and Silver. You do understand that the most beautiful, most physically fit women in the world work in Las Vegas
titty bars. Some of these strippers make “foxes” like Jennifer Anniston and Angelina Jolie look like “dogs” by comparison.

So, I content myself with companionship, intimacy, and safe sex with the most beautiful women in the world. I am way too old to be hustling strippers in titty bars. What I am looking for, of course, is a woman with whom I can share my life. I still have hopes for Tiffany in that respect, but she is a really exotic, high maintenance creature with a ton ofemotional baggage, including all the lesbian bullshit.

Tiffany got fired at the Library after I had seen her twice. She called me while I was down in Blythe and told me that we could go out on dates now, since she no longer worked at the Library. You know, dinner, dancing, thatsort of thing. She also laid down the rules –

You are never going to get any real sex. That turned out to be a lie.

I give the orders, and you take them. Take it or leave it. I cannot relate to men any other way. That is just the way I am. Well, that is verydifficult for a man like me with a dominant, alpha male personality.

I get all the women I want.

You get all the women you want.

Tiffany’s idea of a good time is to masturbate while watching me fuck a woman who turns her on. That hasn’t actually happened yet, but she has made it perfectly clear that she wants to do three ways with me with her lesbiangirlfriends. She has also made it perfectly clear that she likes to watch.

Somehow, this is not my idea of a committed monogamous relationship, but Tiffany is the first woman I have ever truly loved, so I am trying to keepan open mind about how the relationship is going to evolve.

The whole situation is truly bizarre. I am sure some of the strippers I have partied with in the past were lesbians, but this is the first time I have ever knowingly been in a love/sex relationship with a lesbian. Then,of course, there is Silver, who is an incredibly beautiful, wonderful woman.

And then there is Cinnamon. When I told her about some of my adventures with Tiffany, she told me — Well, I am bisexual myself. I didn’t ask her about her diet, but I can tell from the fact that her sweat has no odor thatshe doesn’t eat meat.

Just another vegetarian lesbian stripper.

Go figure.

William Coleman (ramashiva)

——————————–
Link of the Day:
Say Hello To My Little Friend

I am melting, mmellltinggg!

By the way, we’ve fixed comments. And you should get a link back to your site now if you do so.

This entry was posted on Wednesday, December 6th, 2006 at 12:27 am and is filed under Uncategorized.