From: "Edmund Hack" Subject: BARGE 2K Trip Report A few notes on the many high (and few low) points of my ninth BARGE. Bad Beat Before Leaving: The Good Doctor (my wife) is missing her second BARGE, this time due to starting a new job. The upside is that the new job is at a surgicenter (weekdays only, holidays off), instead of at an OB hospital where she has to stay at the hospital every 6th night doing epidurals, weekends and holidays included. --- Transport Issues --- "No rest for the Running Man, why won't they let him be?" [1] In which I relearn that airport parking and off-site car rental are sub-optimal. First Bad Beat, the Flop: The remote parking at IAH is full ($6/day), so off I go to the terminal garage ($10/day) but I'll be able to walk to the car instead of taking the bus. The Turn: although the signs say parking is available, every floor is marked as full, which means the gates won't open. The River: the &#&@ roof has the only spot open and I have to sprint to get to my plane, as I was cutting it short on time after having goodbye lunch with my daughter. First R00ling Hand: I rendezvous with Jeffrey Siegal who offered a ride to town, and also with Scott Burrington, who had also offered but had to go to the strip first to check in. Thanks to both. Next Bad Beat (NBB): Alamo takes almost an hour to award Jeffrey a car. We have a pleasant conversation while in line and on the way to Binion's. I award him a copy of my bustout prize, a custom CD I burned of Al Stewart bootlegs, all obtained from a friend of Al's and featuring some great acoustic guitar and an unreleased track produced by Alan Parsons during the "Modern Times" sessions called "Willie the King" which is about a riverboat poker player. (Copies also went to a few other old timers, as well as KidZee and Chuck.) ---- Tourney Thoughts and Events---- "Watching their faces, I was turning over aces." [2] In which I relearn that I really, really ought to play some tourneys on IRC and Turbo Texas HoldEm before BARGE. HoP: I learn that I suck at Draw and make an early exit. At our table, 5 card stud is as exciting as watching paint dry. TOC: As I sit down, NBB. Four to my right is QB, two to my right is Steve Landrum, to my left is JPM and to his left is Andy Latto. Ai-Ya! I play OK for a while and am busted out after learning I suck at O8 (which I had never played). Team Horse: I play Stud 8 or better for Team Texas. I've only played it at the team event, but I read the Super/System section on it and tried to play like Texas Dolly and David Sklansky told me to. I lose the antes in the first round, lose a few bets in the second and net about $130 in the third round. I could learn to like this game. I also enjoyed the nickel "pinball" slots next to the tourney tables. Barge Championship NLHE: As I sit down, NBB: I am the big blind and Tom Overton is on my immediate left, Nolan Dalla beyond him, Russ Rosenblum on my right. For the second time in a row, I bust the first player out, Peter Caldes. I crippled his stack by calling a small raise with pocket 7s, flopped a set and call his all in bet. He has AA. I win, leaving him with blinds and a little. A couple of hands later my KK (IIRC) beat his Ax suited. I win and am probably chip leader for a few minutes. I win a few more hands, but hit a dry spell for a while so I am blinding my stack and getting slowly ground down. After a call (with KQs) of a preflop raise, I call an all-in bet by a smaller stack after a Kxx board, I lose to AK and am crippled. Tom Overton busts me out as I am about to be blinded out with AA over my 22 and IGHN. IIRC, there were about 7-8 tables left so this was probably my best performance since taking 2nd at the first tourney. Nolan Dalla set himself up for the bad beat of the year - but dodged it: he was small blind and big blind had not arrived for his seat. Fold to Nolan, he announces all in. Dealer mucks hand about 10 seconds before player (whose name escapes me - sorry I'm old, bad with names), arrives in his Mirage bathrobe - he overslept. A yell of "Time!" from the rail might have trapped him. Ai-Ya! Overall, I enjoyed the tourneys, although the HoP was a little less interesting due to the 5 Stud round. --- Gambling in General --- "From the slot machine arcade the light goes streaming to the bikes outside the rock and roll cafe." [3] In which a virgin is deflowered and we find metamorphic rock at 4-8. Craps Tour: Next R00ling Hand (NRH): I join the craps tour, and get Steve Jacobs to bet and roll the dice at the El Cortez. Unfortunately, he sevens out quickly, losing his $11 and his craps virginity at the same time. Virgin luck didn't descend on us like it had before. I had a pretty good roll just before him, netting $22. My mistake was calling the odds bets on during a come out roll - I had about $50 in come bets with odds on them, and lost them twice. The tour heads to the Gold Spike, but they don't have a craps table there. As we head for the Lady Luck, I notice that they have penny slots and suggest adding them to mix, but the crowd votes with it's feet. There are only 2 craps tables at the Lady Luck, one a $5 2x odds one. Foldem is talking to the pit boss, baiting them into turning it into a $2 table, seemingly without success, so I go to the head. After my return, the table had been converted, but no space is available. I spot Jacobs at a blackjack table and join him. NRH: We play for a while, and after some back and forth, I get him to join me in making a Royal Match bet. We both make a nice profit and head back to sleep. I go to the Nugget for some 25 cent VP at the 38 kinds of beer bar, getting a Gordon Biersch draft, a Sierra Nevada Pale Ale, and losing $20 at Deuces Wild. NBB: my slot club card won't work- they have changed systems, so I lose 0.67% in cash and comps. Poker: The NRH is in the low limit HE games. At Binion's ADB Jaeger and I get put in a 1-4-8-8 game. He is to my right, one off the button and he posts a live straddle. I have 8-3 off or other trash and fold. All fold to Jaeger. He is suitably scornful of the craggy rock garden we have landed in - it looked like where Sojourner landed on Mars (ObRocketSci reference). Jaeger is called to 4-8 and leaves a sonic boom in his wake to get there. I follow a short time later. The game has Jester, Jaeger and a local to my left; Steve Jacobs, Beth, ChuChuTrain, Russ Fox, Action Bob, and stevew to the right. After a number of straddles by Jaeger, suckouts and much hilarity, the local rock to his left gets really steamed at us (and getting sucked out on) and leaves. He is replaced by another local, dapper grey haired gentleman. Jaeger goads Beth (?) and the BARGERs at the other end to make this a "must straddle" game. Steve Jacobs, with some encouragement from the table, screws up his nerve and straddles. I guess that on the craps tour he learned a very valuable lesson: "Expectation isn't everything." I continue it to the left, Jester and Jaeger follow on. Now the drama starts! Can we get the new local to straddle? I had been watching him from time to time and had noticed a flicker of a smile twitch his dapper grey moustache at our youthful and boisterous antics. The chant goes up: "straddle! Straddle! STRADDLE!" Another of those fleeting expressions of mirth passes over his face, appearing and vanishing like the flash of a firecracker. His hand moves toward his rack. Could it be? Would it be? The psychic tension builds. The chant continues. It is! The local straddles! He is now a r00ling gamb00ler! A cheer goes up! Jaeger goes over backwards in his chair! After gathering ourselves, the game continues on, with the local gentleman having a good time winning and winning about a rack and a half before getting up. NRH: At another table, a second local was converted before the banquet. I talked with him at the poker cage, and he may join us in RGP. He also saw the power of the straddle, winning a rack, much on a straddle hand with: 7-2 s00ted! Again, much hilarity ensued. NBB: A semi-clueless local woman, Dorothy, won about 5 racks (yes, 5) in a 4-8 game on Sunday that I, Monte C., Oliver Juang, sam_6 and his brother played in. She hit over a dozen hands on the river - straights, flushes & 2 pairs. You name it, she hit it. As I was leaving she was getting looser and looser in her calls. Sigh. Other Games: Overall I won about $100 at poker on the trip, lost $250 at 10-7 double bonus triple play quarter VP, lost $100 in MegaBucks and won $200 or so at BJ. --- The Return to Binion's & Other Events --- "It seems to me as though I've been upon this stage before." [4] In which Jesus delivers a stirring sermon on IRC, and we are welcomed. Kudos to: - Chris Ferguson for playing in the NLHE tournament, for coming to speak to us about Poker and for playing Chow-Aha. NRH: Watching the virtual steam coming out of the ears of the math weenies as he posed his NLH problem for them to solve. NRH: watching the local poker players do double takes as they see just who that is at the end of the Chow-Aha table. BTW, one of them proclaimed Chris to be one of the nicest poker players alive. - Binion's: They really rolled out the red carpet for us. The dealers were glad to see us, and enjoyed dealing to us. Heck, I thought the food at the snack bar and deli was pretty good - I've never stayed there or eaten there before. I thought that Binion's was less smoky than before. The fans in the poker room helped, although the whole place was on the warm side. - Mermaids for the free lei I used as a badge necklace. - All the great poker conversationalists I talked with and overheard. (Special thanks to KidZee for the lobah basic strategy session before the HoP tourney and to Russ Rosenblum for the post mortem on my NLHE play.) - Jaeger for the lesson in advanced straddle theory and metamorphic rock geology. - Monte and Oliver for making watching the local lady suck out such fun - Ratly for making the fish for Steve Jacobs. Steve was part of the glue that held rec.gambling together when it was just the pre-split rec.gambling, IRC Poker wasn't invented, and BARGE didn't have a name. - Bozo and Steve Jacobs for our discussion in which we figure out how to pay for BARGE next year. (More on this later, film at 11.) - tera-Kudos to: KidZee, Chuck W. and all the other BARGE workers and contributors --- Flying Home --- "...your wings against the brushstrokes of the day." [5] In which I give a home player encouragement and find some r00ling going on at home as well as in Las Vegas. Sunday after hearing the great sucking sound at 4-8 (see above) and the MegaBucks attempt, I catch a cab to McCarran for my 7:30 PM flight. I call home and when noone answers, I leave a goodnight message for the family, as I won't be home until after 1 AM and the Good Doctor has to get up at 5 for surgery. The flight is uneventful. NRH: the guy next to me plays poker and we talk about cardrooms. He, like all of the players in his home game, is afraid of playing in Vegas. They think the locals are all sharks waiting to pounce. I try to allay his fears, promote Lee's book as a good guide as to what to expect. (Memo to all the poker columnists out there: encourage the bigger Vegas rooms to spread some 1-2 or free games for the tourists to get their feet wet in. Some of the smaller places do already, IIRC.) A get to IAH a little early, drive into town and get home at 1:15 AM. I notice my pager sitting on a box on the bar, with a paper under it. Then the Final R00ling Hand is turned over: The paper is a W-2G from Grand Casino Coushatta for a $1 royal. The good doctor had gone to play some VP in Louisiana and had broken her dry spell at VP. Cha-Ching! Edmund Hack echack@ev1.net Song lyrics by Al Stewart: [1] "Running Man" [2] "Willie the King" (unreleased) [3] "Apple Cider Reconstitution" [4] "One Stage Before" [5] "Flying Sorcery"