From: David S. Heller Date: Mon, 6 Aug 2007 13:21:49 -0700 Subject: Re: [BARGE] What a long strange trip it was As some of you know, I spent most of July about 10 miles from Dubois, Wyoming (that's pronounced DUboyse, you flat-lander. Only some French foreigner would pronounce it Doobwah), working very, very hard to be a better trial lawyer. It was a complicated and difficult experience which I won't even attempt to describe, other than to say that, after 23 days of it, Las Vegas seemed like a step closer to The Real World. The transition was not easy. There was one incident in Wyoming that I must share, though. One morning we are given an opportunity to demonstrate something, and a lawyer named Sean (who has NEVER been to BARGE) and I stand up and walk forward at the same moment. We stop as we see one another. Our eyes lock. We simultaneously each extend our left palm and each raise our right fist in the universal symbol of "I'll Roshambo you for it". Scissors Scissors Tie! Paper Paper Tie! Rock Rock Tie! A pregnant pause as we each get inside the others' brain. He goes Rock as I go .... Paper! I win!!!! Later, Sean tells me he thought I was a scissors sort of guy, i.e., I would go scissors under stress. I said, "You overcompensated". There was also a micro-mini-poker tournament, in which I chopped first place with another guy. (1st + 2nd)/2 = $20. Tuesday morning 7/31 I got up at about 6 am Mountain Time for the 2+ hour drive to Jackson Airport. Made it on time, got on a puddle-jumper bound for Salt Lake City. Changed to another puddle-jumper and then it's Vegas, baby. I arrived Tuesday afternoon, the earliest I have ever been to BARGE. Taxi ride with a foul-mouthed retired New Jersey cop taxi driver. It is 90-ish degrees so I say to him "What's with the cold snap?" $40 bucks with tip to get to the Golden Nugget. (I can't stay at Binion's - my wife is joining me, and nobody's wife stays at Binion's). I wander over to Binion's, get my stinking badges (no offense, Patrick - they don't really stink) and just hang around. Eventually some of us go up to The Steakhouse for dinner. Then they go off to play in some tournament or other, and I go to sleep. I haven't slept much in the past 3 weeks. Wednesday morning is The Egg and I. Good food, good company. Thanks, Ice! That was about the last good beat of the week for me. I go back to Binion's and can't win at either the 4-8 or even the 2-4 hold'em game. The closest thing I can compare it to would be my one foray into California poker, at ESCARGOT some years ago: Everyone plays every hand from every position. Everyone sees every flop. Every possible straight and every possible flush that can be made, is made by every player playing any two cards, suited or not. What a great game, you say. Indeed. At one point I lost $40 in 20 minutes at 2-4, that's how great a game it was. I should have followed the advice in my fortune cookie - go to the roulette table and bet my bankroll on black. Anyway, Wednesday night I played in the lowball tournament. I was very calm and relaxed because (a) I didn't have to think about how much to bet and (b) I have no idea what I'm doing at lowball, I freely acknowledge I am dead money, and therefore I felt no pressure. (I did actually learn something from last year's lowball tournament. I don't think I learned anything this year, though). It was a nice table, full of easy-to-beat players like JP and Bob O and The Gavin. I was there for the Great Gavin Offer to Bob O. Those who read my trip report of last year may remember that I said what a good man Gavin truly is. Nothing I saw this year changed my mind. Thursday morning was CHORSE. I had a great team. But the hits just keep on coming, and I have almost no playable hands the whole time, and 3 of them lost. The best hand I had was a 6-4 after 5 cards, but I could NOT get my opponent to put any more money in the pot. My A234 on 4 cards wound up being a *very* smooth 8 which lost a big pot to a *very* rough 7. So it goes. Thursday night we go to the Casino Formerly Known as Aladdin for their fabulous buffet, and walk around for about 2 hours in the cool 90 degree weather. I show my wife the scene of last year's BARGE, and we watch a fountain show, etc. Friday is the symposium. Our s00per sekrit formula for success works - we ultimately will have 2 players at the final table. Then it's karaoke time. I don't inflict my voice on the crowd, but just sing along quietly. My wife *can* sing, and she does. Saturday morning is the Main Event. In 2005 I didn't make the money but felt I played well. I built up a medium large stack and got all my money in with AK and pot odds against the big stack who played JJ, which held up. If I had won that near-coin flip, I probably would have made the money, if not the final table. In 2006, I did make the final table. In 2007, I just sucked. I never seemed to get into the zone. I couldn't read anyone or anything. I don't know why - somehow my brain was not in The Poker Zone this year. I have KK and an A flops. I have JJ and a K flops. I was out shortly after the first break when my JT lost to AA. The only good decision I made was not buying myself back. I guess I just had a feeling this wasn't my day. Saturday night the food was pretty good. Thanks, Chuck, for taking care of my dinner arrangements. I really enjoyed Gavin's talk. The roast? Well, let's just say we could have done without certain of the roasters. Which ones will be left as an exercise for the reader. Sunday morning I left before 5 am to catch a 6:45 flight. Delta threatened to fly us to Portland and abandon us there, but wound up landing in Seattle anyway. End of journey. Back to work today. Thanks to all who put BARGE on, and thanks to all those friends I was happy to see again. To those I missed this year, sorry I was pre-occupied. I'll see you next year!