No, it’s not that Amy. There is something important happening on the 20th of this month. I will be sure to post about it here. I just wanted to hype you up about it. It’s gonna be cool. It involves me and a bunch of other people. And it has nothing to do with poker! [grin]
On that note, don’t forget that this Sunday is the Blogger Poker tournament! I am fully registered and the prizes look really cool. I have been doing my best to work on my online strategy too. It’s really not that easy to play against people you can’t see. There is very little you can get from them. Even with the way the software works now, you can’t watch how they bet because they may have checked the box early on to auto bet or check. So it’s purely a matter of watching for patterns. Does this person always bet high when they have something? Do they bluff a lot? That and playing the averages of your hand. I tend to fold a lot when it comes to a crappy starting hand. If I have something halfway decent, and the call isn’t that much, I will hold out for the flop. If I am still in the decent range and no one is raising outrageous amounts, I may stay in, but If cave pretty easy with a weak hand.
I try and practice online with real people, but I did pick up something shotly after my trip that I love to practice on. It’s the PSP game for World Series of Poker. I hae been looking at it for a while and after the trip I picked it up (used) for pretty cheap. I like it, it’s a good AI and a great way to quickly learn the game. Of course, the downside is, I recently learned that there is a new game coming out for PSP called Stacked. It is sponsored by one of my favorite poker pro’s, Daniel Negreanu. It comes out at the end of this month and it is supposed to be the bomb-diggity! I’ll let you know after the 28th.
The act of prying myself out of bed Monday was difficult, seeing as how I was still exhausted from the day of travel and such the day before. I really didn’t want to waste too much time though so it wasn’t long before we were up and moving on the first full day in Vegas! We started out by jumping on the Monorail system and taking it all the way to the other side of the strip. Once we got off it was an easy walk over to the New York New York hotel. We decided that the Irish pub in the hotel would be a great place to start our day out (of course this was getting close to noon so it was defiantly time for lunch) This was the hotel were we were first acquainted with our enemy in Vegas…… The Star wars slot machine.
Right outside the pub there was this glowing set of machines bearing the all too familiar logo of STAR WARS. At the top was a Death Star adorned with numbers, and the main screen flashed all sorts of games. Since this was indeed a slot machine, you had the standard deal. You put in 1 dollar and you got 100 “credits” You could then decide how they were spent. You can choose the standard 1 line across like every other slot machine, or you could break the mold and have every line imaginable zig zaged across the screen. We usually just chose to use 10 lines, it had a nice pattern and we weren’t blowing 10 bucks with every turn. If you happened to get the right pattern on one of your lines, you got paid! If Darth Vader and Obi Wan appeared on the screen it would launch into a mini game. You had to choose one to win, if they won, you get paid! (If your pick didn’t win, you got a consolidation prize still). And the big game was of course the death star! If you get 3 death stars on your screen (in one of your lines) the machine goes off. It starts with three storm troopers that come out and you have to shoot one of them, this determines which of the three arrows on the top of the death star you are watching. Then three more troopers to determine the arrow at the bottom of the death star. The ball starts spinning and when it stops, the two numbers are added up and multiplied by how much you initially bet (for Arik that was like 5 or 10). As you can see, we got a little involved in this game. The girls actually had to drag us away to go eat.
The pub was great. I love eating in Irish pubs, the atmosphere is always fun. Sadly my fish and chips were not the best I had ever had. But the company was great, Amy even made the effort to work down a hamburger. (Don’t forget, she was still dog sick here). With our full bellies in tow we started down the strip towards the Bellagio hotel. Amy is a big lover of fountains. Any time we ever pas a fountain she is just mesmerized by it. Knowing this, I knew that stopping by the Bellagio would be a must. We had about 10 minutes while the sprayers warmed up and then on with the show. To the tune of “Fly me to the moon by Frank Sinatra, the water danced at heights of close to 5 stories tall. (more or less, I am pretty much just making up stats at this point). Amy was lost in the moment, she loved the show. While we were there someone said that over in the Paris hotel they do a thunderstorm show indoors that similar to the fountains, we added that to our checklist, but first… Caesars Palace!
Home to many a boxing event and apparently to Celine Dion, It was time to visit the ever famous Caesars Palace! (No, we did not, nor do we ever plan to visit Miss “Give them Kayaks” Dion). In the area known as the Forum Shops there is an aquarium where they do an animatronics show about Atlantis. So we thought that would be a cool (and free) show to go see. But first, the group needed a drink. Pineapple rum punch should do the trick, let’s get 2 of those! 2 glasses? Noooooo 2 Pitchers!!! Let’s get this day started, it’s after noon. This got especially fun when Amy was on the phone with her dad and uncle and we are shoving drinks at her. With only seconds to spare we did manage to get our tipsy butts down to the Atlantis show. It was pretty damn cool for just a walk by show. Now it was off to the Paris for the thunderstorm show. Or so we thought.
It was a quick walk across the street to the Paris hotel and we were defiantly feeling tipsy. Looking up at the Eifel tower didn’t help that much. When we walked in we were taken by all of the French décor. Not knowing where to go, I was instantly nominated to go and ask for directions. Sadly I was quickly informed that the Thunderstorm show isn’t in the Paris but back in Caesars Palace!! We were just going to have to let this one go. We took a shortcut through Bally’s to head back to the Monorail. It was time to hit the “Star Trek Experience.” Arik is a big Star Trek fan, so it was very appropriate to take him to the Las Vegas Hilton for the Star Trek Experience. For those who have never been there. There are two rides that take you into the Star Trek world. There is a very cool museum with all sorts of props. Another of the main draws is Quarks Bar. It’s a neat little restaurant and bar. This is where we decided to eat dinner.
Our waitress looked less than thrilled to be working in a Star Trek bar and serving a bunch of geeks. We tried to get her to smile a few times, like asking her to say the name “HamBORGer” a few times. She did her best to put smiles on our faces like bringing us our “Warp Core Breach” which is a giant drink in a smoking bowl. I think Lee drank the most of that one. While we were eating a few of the costumed people came around to visit tables. One was a pretty cute klingon girl (cute is, of course a relative term when referring to a klingon) and a tall blue Andorian guy. This guy was the epitome of a geek getting into his part. He was so serious and there was no way to get him to break his character. We actually ran into him a few times and it was the same at every encounter. 
After our trip around the galaxy, we decided to head back to the hotel and take a break. This, of course, lead to us working our way down to the casino floor for some full blown gambling. I had gotten it in my head that I wanted to play some poker. Actually sit down at a table and play with a bunch of money and a bunch of strangers. I had originally saved up $100 just for this purpose. I had also thought that I would need that much. Turns out I only needed to buy in with $20 (I did $40 actually). I handed Amy another $40 and sent her off to the slot machines while I headed to the tables. From what I gathered I was gone for about an hour and a half. Arik and Lee played more of the Star Wars slots, Amy managed to loose $20 in various slots and they all went back up to the room to order ice cream.
I was in another world. This world was green felted and ruled over by four warring houses governed by a monarchy that sucked the life out of many a passing Vegas tourist. The game was Texas Hold Em’ and I had never played before (except for Arik’s quick tutorial). The guys at the cashier’s cage said to just follow along with the other players and the dealer will usually help you out as well. And they did, a few times I was ready to fold when all I needed to do was check. And they were kind enough to advise me when to lay down my blinds and such. After a few hands, I was out there bluffing with the best of them. The guy to my right was raking in the chips, and the lady to my left was loosing them. I don’t think I was doing all that bad, at one point I was up to about $70 total. When I finally left the table (they were going to merge us because a number of people had left) I had $18 of my $40. The upside is that I spent an hour and a half learning a fun game, and having a blast doing it. That money well spent!
When I went upstairs to report in my loosing to the gang, I found them in Arik’s room ordering up desert and Amy sitting off in the corner. She looked a little down so I asked if she was feeling any better. She said no so I took her up to the other room to take a shower for a bit. Turns out one of the reasons she was feeling down (aside from the flu) was that she had lost all of the whole $20 I gave her. This would be the point where I started laughing. I know it’s not nice, but it was really funny. I love her to death but she always knows how to make me laugh. Apparently this really bothered her and she really wanted to come away with more or at least break even, but she just couldn’t stop. After my giggles were done I explained that the money I gave her was to go and have fun, I didn’t care if it got lost, and it was meant for her to experience the slots. After I re-assured her of all this, I think she felt a little better. Long story made short, and I love her to death but, if I didn’t expect it to be lost, I wouldn’t have given it to her!
We went back down in time for the ice cream to arrive and rounded out the evening BSing about what we have done and how much fun we had. Amy and I didn’t stay up too much later as we needed to get up early to catch the flight home. As much as I would love to go into the whole trip home, it was fairly un-eventful. We left at 8am Vegas time and, after a four hour layover in SFO we landed back home at midnight Tuesday night. It was a long day of travel (thank the gods for my PSP). In the future I think we will schedule the days of travel to be excess to the vacation! And on that note I will wrap up the Vegas trip report. Now I have to write about the last two weeks of what happened here!!
Where the heck did I leave off? This is what happens when I get too busy with work and such, I loose track of my stories. So, we arrive in Vegas finally! After getting off the plane the first thing anyone ever notices i8n the Las Vegas airport is the slot machines! They certainly know how to make you feel like you are in Vegas instantly. Our plane landed at the same time at Arik and Sam, so we needed to make our way down to baggage claim to go find them. As we were standing just outside the tram to baggage claim, we were looking up at the arrival board to see when their plan might have landed. Just then, this really rude guy starts pushing me towards the tram! Not even 5 min in Vegas and I am already getting shoved around, How rude!! Of wait, it’s Arik. I guess he found me first.
We do all of our initial hugs and greets on the tram and eventually get our luggage. Now it’s off to the shuttle stop. Here is where I give you Vegas hit number 1. Take a damn Taxi! You see, Arik bought their tickets for Vegas from Expedia.com, and apparently they got free shuttle passes. To keep everyone together, I got Amy and I tickets on the same shuttle. They were 5 bucks for each of us so $10 total. Then we sat and waited for the bus. 
20 min later we finally ask one of the other bus drivers if he can take us and he does. Now we all pile on this very full bus with the windows all shaded and some really ugly carpet lined ceiling (think Farpoint, only worse (very inside joke)). We can barely see out of the windows to know where we are and we are in there for well over 30 min. The Sahara hotel is the last stop of course. Turns out a taxi from the airport takes roughly 10 min total and costs 12 bucks. (Really Lee, you got jipped!) 
Since Amy and I were rooming with Lee and Missy, we waited with Arik and Sam to get their room. Then we were able to stow our bags until Lee arrived. I guess there are a lot of people checking in mid day on Sunday because the line for the front desk was huge! It felt like celebration 3 all over again! We get up to Arik and Sam’s room and they have a really cool view of this test track behind the hotel. Apparently for $10 you can take a sports car around this track. It looked pretty tempting but we had much more stuff to do. First on the list was some food!
One side of the Sahara has a whole Nascar theme to it (no, I don’t know why). So we thought we would try out the Nascar café. Seeing as how we knew that once Lee and Missy got in we would probably be getting some food as well, we opted for just some Nachos and Buffalo wings. Arik got the bright idea to get the wings full up buffalo style. Oh man were they hot. We were both sweating buffalo for the next few hours. Amy was doing her best to get some food in her but she was still suffering from a topsy turvey stomach. After trying our hand at a few Nascar trivia questions (and failing) we went outside to figure out what was next.
About 2-3 blocks away from the Sahara is the Stratosphere hotel. If you haven’t seen it, it looks a lot like a version of the Space Needle in WA. Except this one has a number of carnival rides on the top of it. We figured it would have one hell of a view so we started off towards it. Vegas hint number 2: Stay away from the newspaper machines that are filled with pr0n! As I was walking along the street, tactfully avoiding all of the people and porn pushers, I walk past one of these newspaper dispensers that has the call girl ad’s in it and my hand smacks into the corner of it, hard. I know it doesn’t sound bad, but I hit right on the corner and I had what looked like a bite mark on the back of my hand. After about an hour it even started swelling a little! Anyways, we made it all the way to the Stratosphere and are about to get in the elevator to head to the top when we get a phone call from Lee and Missy, they are in their hotel room and ready to meet up! Doh! So we make the trek back to the Sahara.
We got into the theater and the stage was open and set up great. I was so excited. I had bought the soundtrack to the show well over a year or two ago. You better believe I had already had the songs memorized. (I did my best to not sing out loud). If you haven’t seen the show, Avenue Q is a musical that, for the most part, makes fun of Sesame Street. It’s basically what would happen when you mix Sesame street and the modern ghetto. This makes for 2 hours of “oh my god” funny. With such classic songs as “What do you do with a BA in English” and “The Internet is for Porn.” (yes, that’s where the song came from) This is a must see for anyone! (except kids)
I am not even sure where I left off but I can tell you this, this last week has been non-stop. I think I am going to start with Friday. Last weekend was rough. We took the opportunity to relax at home Friday night, watch a movie, and maybe start some cleaning of the house. Overall it wasn’t too bad. We watched Herbie Fully Loaded. I really am an Old school Herbie fan and believe it or not, I liked this movie! It was very cute and had all of the typical Herbie elements in it. They took the opportunity to give Herbie a little more emotion through CGI and it worked out well. If you want a fun little family movie that will take you back to being a little kid watching your favorite bug come to life, check this one out.
Friday night took a turn for the worse when Amy started getting sick. Sure enough, it looks like she managed to pick up the stomach flu along the way. Due to this, we took Saturday nice and easy. We cleaned up the house and did almost all of the laundry. (You know, I don’t think we have ever finished all of the laundry.) Around 4ish we shipped Andrew off to stay with Heather and then finished up packing for the trip. We had to be very careful to hide the bags we were packing. You see, Charlie (my cat) doesn’t like it when we leave. He tends to freak out. So this time we closed all the doors and packed in secrecy. I think it worked, he knew something was going on, but wasn’t sure what. I really want to say that we went to bed early to prepare for the morning wake up, but we all know that never happens. Sure enough, with a 4am alarm, I went to sleep at about 1am.
With all the bags packed and everything ready to go, it took no time to get out the door on Sunday morning. We got to Dulles early enough to give us plenty of time. We parked in economy and I gave the truck a good kiss and hug, assuring it that we would only be gone three days. Now it’s all hurry up and wait. There was a small line for the tickets, a small line at security, although, the security checkpoint at Dulles was one of the coolest. They had this archway you had to stand in that does like a borg scan of you with sniffers and lights and such. It was the coolest bit of tech I have seen in an airport since the x-ray machine. At the gate we were stuck for the nest 1 ½ hours, thankfully I brought the PSP and Amy had her game boy. (we are such geeks) The current play list for the PSP is Midnight Club, Lumines, Midway Arcade, and Grand Theft Auto: Vice City. I know I said I wouldn’t ever buy a GTA game, but in order to do any of the Homebrew stuff on PSP you need it. (And it’s not all that bad of a game, certainly not as bad as San Andres) Ahh they are calling our gate, next stop Los Angeles! 
We landed in LAX and now had 4 hours to kill. To be honest, most of this part is a blur because I was pretty tired. I remember walking through the airport and noticing the lack of anything good to eat. I was forced to choose from a McDonalds and a Wolfgang Puck (fast food version). Well, since the last time I ate Mickie D’s I got sick and swore it off for life, I guess we know where I was going. Thinking back now, I wonder if that was the right choice. I paid $7.50 for extremely runny eggs, greasy bacon, and some bread thing that I wasn’t sure what it was made out of. I really wanted to call up Wolfgang and bitch him out! Well we did find a way to kill off the hours, (even though Amy’s stomach was still doing loops) and the next stop was Las Vegas! Which will be continued in the next post.
Yup, here we are, the day after. I have to say, whole it wasn’t the worst birthday I have ever had, this birthday was not all that great. Like I had said before, work is getting crazy stressful so when it comes to weekends I am really looking forward to just relaxing and taking the time off. Lately though it seems like my weekends are just non-stop stuff till Sunday. With cleaning and errands and work etc.. Friday wasn’t bad, I got taken out to dinner by a friend and such, but… Right before that I had to ground Andrew for doing something bad at school. (Not gonna go into it, but it wasn’t all that bad) So this put me in a down mood for Friday night. 
Saturday I got to sleep in a little. When we woke up, we took our time and got things together for the Baseball game. Andrew did a great job and they ended up winning a very close game. After that we went over to Panara bread to sit and play on the laptops for a while. You see, Amy just got a new toy. A 12″ Powerbook G4. she loves it! It’s very tiny so it fits her well. It does have a small problem in that the touchpad is sticking up a bit, but it’s fully covered and can be fixed. After our lunch we decided to hit up the Apple store down at Tysons corner. A very nice store indeed. They actually do little workshops and such for people and it’s free to attend. Amy got a little lesson on her mac from the Genius bar. Shortly afterwards we decided we should just go home and relax.
Keep in mind that for the weekend, Andrew was still grounded. He complained endlessly when we went to the Apple store, was “bored” the whole time we were out. When we got home we watched a little Battlestar Galactica (You still suck Doc) and during that he was ok, but afterwards, when he had to go back to his room, he was Capt. attitude. This just caused me to get angrier which caused me to yell more which made me more stressed. By 11pm he was sent to bed and by 1am I was fuming. I didn’t sleep well and woke up on Sunday morning in a very grumpy mood.
Amy was nice enough to make me a bagel and Chai for breakfast. She had to leave shortly afterwards because she had to work. After a while of lounging and general waking up, I left to go to the store while Andrew stayed home to clean. I hit the comic store and the grocery store and just took my time being out. I did call my mom for mothers day. That phone call didn’t go well (not that many of them do.) When I finally got back home I needed to sit down and take a test for school.
I applied at a school called AIU. They specialize in online school. I had everything I needed to start except one class, but I could take one of their online tests and take care of that. Problem was, it was math. I hate math. The test wasn’t supposed to be that hard and was only 20 questions. I started it and from the first question I knew I was in trouble. The questions they asked were insane! I could see how, if you were trying to interpolate the escape velocity of a Saturn IV rocket from a mars atmosphere with 3000lb of nitrogen fuel and a 54kilo payload, then knowing this sort of math would seem prudent. But how many people in the world do that sort of thing. (I dare anyone to find the answer to that one) When the test was over it didn’t show what I missed, how many I missed or anything just a:
Sorry for the lack of updates lately. I have been a little overwhelmed at work. I get in early and end up having to stay late, and it’s usually non stop the whole time I am there. By the time I get home, I really either don’t want to sit at the computer or am too tired. I am hoping that we get a little extra help at work soon because I see myself getting burnt out really quick if I continue like this. Keep your fingers crossed!
On a lighter note, the plan for the Vegas trip is well underway. Tickets are done, room is done, all that left is to get out there and have some fun! I am really looking forward to this trip. I need a vacation like crazy. The downside is that it’s only going to be an extended weekend, but I will take what I can get. We are staying in the Sahara hotel on the strip and meeting up with Lee Missy, Arik, and Sam. Of course the original plan of meeting up with Amy’s dad fell through, but that’s ok, I know I will be meeting him soon enough. The trip isn’t for 2 more weeks so I hope to be posting before then. I believe I owe you a Baseball post. Till then!
No really! This weekend was actually a fairly busy one! Andrew has been on spring break this last week and finished it out on Friday with some good gaming. (: (He and I both of course) I have been doing a lot of DDO and he has really gotten into Americas Army. Amy got to go out with some of her work friends so that left just me and the kid at home alone. 
Saturday we had the joys of little league. I dropped Andrew off at 10am for that. Amy had another appointment that she had to run. This means that I get a good hour and ½ of me time! This usually involves me lounging on the couch and being a loaf, but hey, if that’s how I want to spend my time! Around noonish we go pick up Andrew and stop off for lunch at the 
After pool we went home for a quick break and then it was OFF TO THE CIRCUS!!! Yup, the 
Our seats were really good, right in front of one of the side rings and right next to the Vortex of doom. Amy managed to get some 
Sunday we got up and realized it was Easter. Since I am not much of an Easter person, I really didn’t have much planned. I went out and picked up some Starbucks and an extra surprise. They had a really cool egg hunt kit. When I got back I set up breakfast on the patio and hid some eggs for Amy and Andrew. They had fun hunting around for them. Even Charlie (my cat) got to get out and enjoy the weather. After that it was jump into spring cleaning mode. We went full bore and got tons of stuff cleaned! It feels great to have the place clean, like a moral boost! Now if we can just keep it that way!
