Trip Report
Well, I've finally returned from my long trip and I've decided to give you all what you've always wanted--a long entry with only marginal NBA content. For your convenience, I will divide the entry into subsections, so that you can ignore the boring ones and just go straight to the parts that interest you.
Timberwolves
Bulls vs. Clippers
I Got A Lap Dance From Joe Mauer
Poker In Vegas
Timberwolves
I'm sort of glad I wasn't around to see this week. I caught part of most of the games on TV while I was wandering the casinos of Las Vegas. I'd give the Wolves no more than a 10% chance of making the playoffs. Currently, they're 2 ½ games behind the Nuggets and are 4 games back in the loss column. The Nuggets are streaking and have an easier remaining schedule. The Wolves will be a lottery team and we won't see McHale back next year.
Bulls vs. Clippers
When I left for the game, my poll was all tied up, so I had no idea who to cheer for. For the first half, I mostly just cheered whenever somebody made a play I liked. After the Clippers took a fairly substantial lead I started to pull for the Bulls. They managed to make a strong run, and if it hadn't been for some bad calls and a bunch of missed layups, they would have won.
I was disappointed that Luol Deng play, but I did get a healthy dose of Eddie Curry and he was a monster. The guy was huge and had tremendous offensive game. His defense has taken a bad rap, but it looked pretty solid the day we were there.
We got to the game a bit early before either team had come on the court and the only person who was out there was Tyson Chandler. It was funny to watch, because he was trying to do low post moves with nobody guarding him and he couldn't do anything. He was trying little baby hooks and turn around jumpers with nobody guarding him and couldn't make then. Really, I wish I had gotten a video of it, it was hilarious. I mean, you'd think some of them would go in by accident.
I Got A Lap Dance From Joe Mauer
The first full day we had been in Vegas, we met up with some of Petey's friends who were locals down there. We played in a multi-table poker tournament at the Orleans with them. The tournament was fun, but I found myself without a hand almost the entire time and eventually was forced to go all-in with KQ and ran into AK.
Afterwards, the other guys all wanted to go to a strip club. For reasons I won't go into, I didn't really want to go to one. I had never been to a strip club before, and had good reason to believe that I really wouldn't enjoy it too much. However, being in Vegas and having already been drinking for 6 straight hours, I decided to give in an go to one. My figuring was that I would just sit back and let them do whatever they wanted. I explained to one of the guys on the way over my reasons for not wanting to go and my desire to just chill once we got in there. In a sentence, here's what happened next:
I entered the club and took a seat. Within 5 minutes (even before I was able to get a drink), there was a stripper sitting on my lap and she was wearing my shirt!!!
One of the guys decided that my plan was total bullshit and that in order to have a good strip club experience, I needed to be thrown in head first. He explained to the stripper that I didn't want to come to the club and he bought me a lap dance. I was wearing my brand new Joe Mauer jersey and the stripper decided that it would make me more comfortable if she pretended to be a baseball player.
She proceeded to ask me to take off my shirt and then yelled "Take it off!" when I didn't comply immediately (wasn't I supposed to be the one yelling that?). So I took it off and she put it on and then told me to "Call her Joe". So I started saying stuff to her like "I always thought you'd be taller" and "How's your knee?". I was going to ask what position she played, but decided not to embarrass her by asking her a question she would have almost no chance of getting right.
At this point my friends were yelling at me for somehow getting a stripper to put more clothes on. Of course, she eventually took off my shirt and a good time was had by all.
Poker In Vegas
As many of you already know, I'm a big poker fan. I play online almost everyday and have had fairly good success over my career. Oddly enough, prior to this trip I had never actually played live poker in a casino. Every time I thought about taking a trip to Canterbury, I just decide that I could make more by just playing online. Not having much live experience, I decided to stick mostly to lower limit games. The highest I played was $6/$12 with a $10/$20 kill. I was on the list to play the $8/$16 game at the Bellagio the night before we left, but unfortunately--despite having games going at every table--we waited around for and hour and a half without a single person in front of me being called. Petey had been on the $4/$8 list, but that list wasn't moving very quickly either, so we just decided to take off.
The most important thing I learned about live games is that they're much, much softer than online games. The $6/$12 I played at the Mirage was the only game that was actually fairly tight, and from what I understand, that table was a bit of an anomaly. Just before I left, the game seemed to soften up a bit. It was not uncommon to see 6 or 7 people to the flop on every hand, and I never really needed to worry about having people play back at me because I could just look at them and tell they weren't going to do anything.
Of course, the big disadvantage is that the games are extremely slow as well. Even the fast ones deal no more than 35 hands/per hour. I'm used to playing online at 4-6 tables simultaneously and getting about 10 times that.
Altogether, the games are quite fun, and I'd highly recommend a Vegas trip to anybody who enjoys poker. Especially at the lower limits, you get to meet people who aren't too serious and are just there to have a good time. You also get free drinks, which is a definite plus. It certainly makes me want to get out there and play at Canterbury at some point.
Timberwolves
Bulls vs. Clippers
I Got A Lap Dance From Joe Mauer
Poker In Vegas
Timberwolves
I'm sort of glad I wasn't around to see this week. I caught part of most of the games on TV while I was wandering the casinos of Las Vegas. I'd give the Wolves no more than a 10% chance of making the playoffs. Currently, they're 2 ½ games behind the Nuggets and are 4 games back in the loss column. The Nuggets are streaking and have an easier remaining schedule. The Wolves will be a lottery team and we won't see McHale back next year.
Bulls vs. Clippers
When I left for the game, my poll was all tied up, so I had no idea who to cheer for. For the first half, I mostly just cheered whenever somebody made a play I liked. After the Clippers took a fairly substantial lead I started to pull for the Bulls. They managed to make a strong run, and if it hadn't been for some bad calls and a bunch of missed layups, they would have won.
I was disappointed that Luol Deng play, but I did get a healthy dose of Eddie Curry and he was a monster. The guy was huge and had tremendous offensive game. His defense has taken a bad rap, but it looked pretty solid the day we were there.
We got to the game a bit early before either team had come on the court and the only person who was out there was Tyson Chandler. It was funny to watch, because he was trying to do low post moves with nobody guarding him and he couldn't do anything. He was trying little baby hooks and turn around jumpers with nobody guarding him and couldn't make then. Really, I wish I had gotten a video of it, it was hilarious. I mean, you'd think some of them would go in by accident.
I Got A Lap Dance From Joe Mauer
The first full day we had been in Vegas, we met up with some of Petey's friends who were locals down there. We played in a multi-table poker tournament at the Orleans with them. The tournament was fun, but I found myself without a hand almost the entire time and eventually was forced to go all-in with KQ and ran into AK.
Afterwards, the other guys all wanted to go to a strip club. For reasons I won't go into, I didn't really want to go to one. I had never been to a strip club before, and had good reason to believe that I really wouldn't enjoy it too much. However, being in Vegas and having already been drinking for 6 straight hours, I decided to give in an go to one. My figuring was that I would just sit back and let them do whatever they wanted. I explained to one of the guys on the way over my reasons for not wanting to go and my desire to just chill once we got in there. In a sentence, here's what happened next:
I entered the club and took a seat. Within 5 minutes (even before I was able to get a drink), there was a stripper sitting on my lap and she was wearing my shirt!!!
One of the guys decided that my plan was total bullshit and that in order to have a good strip club experience, I needed to be thrown in head first. He explained to the stripper that I didn't want to come to the club and he bought me a lap dance. I was wearing my brand new Joe Mauer jersey and the stripper decided that it would make me more comfortable if she pretended to be a baseball player.
She proceeded to ask me to take off my shirt and then yelled "Take it off!" when I didn't comply immediately (wasn't I supposed to be the one yelling that?). So I took it off and she put it on and then told me to "Call her Joe". So I started saying stuff to her like "I always thought you'd be taller" and "How's your knee?". I was going to ask what position she played, but decided not to embarrass her by asking her a question she would have almost no chance of getting right.
At this point my friends were yelling at me for somehow getting a stripper to put more clothes on. Of course, she eventually took off my shirt and a good time was had by all.
Poker In Vegas
As many of you already know, I'm a big poker fan. I play online almost everyday and have had fairly good success over my career. Oddly enough, prior to this trip I had never actually played live poker in a casino. Every time I thought about taking a trip to Canterbury, I just decide that I could make more by just playing online. Not having much live experience, I decided to stick mostly to lower limit games. The highest I played was $6/$12 with a $10/$20 kill. I was on the list to play the $8/$16 game at the Bellagio the night before we left, but unfortunately--despite having games going at every table--we waited around for and hour and a half without a single person in front of me being called. Petey had been on the $4/$8 list, but that list wasn't moving very quickly either, so we just decided to take off.
The most important thing I learned about live games is that they're much, much softer than online games. The $6/$12 I played at the Mirage was the only game that was actually fairly tight, and from what I understand, that table was a bit of an anomaly. Just before I left, the game seemed to soften up a bit. It was not uncommon to see 6 or 7 people to the flop on every hand, and I never really needed to worry about having people play back at me because I could just look at them and tell they weren't going to do anything.
Of course, the big disadvantage is that the games are extremely slow as well. Even the fast ones deal no more than 35 hands/per hour. I'm used to playing online at 4-6 tables simultaneously and getting about 10 times that.
Altogether, the games are quite fun, and I'd highly recommend a Vegas trip to anybody who enjoys poker. Especially at the lower limits, you get to meet people who aren't too serious and are just there to have a good time. You also get free drinks, which is a definite plus. It certainly makes me want to get out there and play at Canterbury at some point.
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