Sleep With the Fishes, Dine on the Whales

After a decent night's rest, yesterday morning I sought out a Starbucks and like most things on the strip, just because you can see it doesn't mean it's close by.  Add in 108 degree heat and a quick walk devolves into something else.  Everybody talks about dry heat, but 100+ degrees is 100+ degrees.  When you are on foot it's so hot part of you hopes the asphalt doesn't melt and slowly absorb you.  It's always a guantlet just going a city block trying to stave off the ever present horde of flier hander-outers.  If you walk outside every half block you'll feel the cold tractor beam pull of streetside casinos as their wide open doors offer promise of a much cooler place. Those smart casinos blast their AC on to the strip.  No amount of neon can compare to the efficacy of drawing in customers as a well positioned air flow.  I almost wonder if the casinos hire the guys on the strip with the handouts to chase the tourists inside too.  Maybe the strip clubs

Yesterday, I flew from New Orleans to LA to Las Vegas.  Going to LAX of course I was star sighting.  Sure enough I saw Thor's brother, who my wife tells me is engaged to Myley Cyrus walking around with one of those beanie type hats.  I identified him as d-bag first and then I saw it was a word class d-bag.  Thought that was it for star gazing but then I got on my plane and was walking back to economy class when this petite, rather pretty lady starting walking against traffic toward me and first class.  Huge sunglasses and a hand covering her face a little bit.  Hello Paula Abdul.  I stop at the open seat to let her in, even as others struggled past her.  She didn't say thank you.   Maybe she was worried I'd recognize her voice (she's right that verbal honey would instantly take me back to her immortal duet with Skat Kat ). Then I'd be able to see through her watermelon sized specs and identify her as Paula Abdul...  Or maybe she's just not polite.  I fo

I'm getting a little ahead of myself in preparation for the WSOP.  I'm writing in advance some more blogs for www.pokerblog.com and for the party poker blog that will be up in the coming weeks (check out those sites) because I hope I will have zero time to blog these stories because of all the playing I'm doing by going deep in Vegas.  Here's the topics, I'll be writing about and some bullet points for you to look for if you are interested. * Congrats to Jeremy Halaska .  In one of the blogs I'm writing, I talk about a friend who I met on the circuit this year and his recent success.  On a greedy personal note (smiley face thing to let you know I'm only half serious) I hope it bodes well for me.  I know my recent upswing in poker was tied in large part to seeing my business partner Gene D go and dominate the IP tournament in November.  His triumphs gave me this huge bout of confidence, after a stretch of running bad, and I used his success as inspiration.

Bits and Bites: *Did another blog recently.... http://www.pokerblog.com/blog/the-avengers-pokers-mightiest-players.html What poker players do you think match up best with the movie Avengers? I feel like I should have included Loki in that list after the fact...  Course I had Hellmuth as Iron Man though he might work as Loki especially with his verbose speeches and villain persona.  Or, for those with a rich knowledge of poker history or have merely read the book:  The Professor, The Banker, and the Suicide King, perhaps Andy Beal. He's the man that singlehandedly tried to take down a cabal of poker's elite.  Ivey, Brunson, Harman, etc.  That group would make a pretty good Avengers circa 2000.  Any other suggestions? *Played in the Mega That Wasn't... With the promise of a Main Event seat, and a chance to go to Vegas to have that guaranteed for my package buyers I went to Harrahs on Sunday to basically play a two table tournament.  I ran into Kenny Milam's