The Good Stuff

Lest you think from my last post that nothing good came of the weekend, let's correct that. It was a good trip. I had a blast meeting new people and hanging with some old friends. I had a ball playing Pai Gow with the Astin and the Penner boyz. I had a great dinner with Bayne, T, Special K, Blood, Stb, Mattazuma, Columbo and Alan and others, and the FullTiltForum.com private HORSE tourney that I crashed with Matt, Statikkling, Shamanalix and Columbo was an absolute hoot!

But I learned something on this trip. Five days without my wife by my side is too long for me to be "on vacation." It would be different if I were Otis or CC or Spaceman (but I still don't think I could hang), and I was working during the periods of separation from my wife, but for five days to wake up in an empty bed was just a little too long for me. I had a good time meandering along, but next time I make a Vegas trip sans wife, it'll have to be shorter. Then I can leave Vegas wanting more, rather than leaving Vegas wanting to be home.

But anywho, that's next time (BTW, next time starts on July 30, and the wifey and I will be staying downtown at the Plaza with some other friends. If you're local, I'll call you. If you're not, and you'll be in town, you call me) and this is this time, which should be a trip report, part 3 - the Good Stuff. The good stuff started Thursday night with bowling (upon which we descended after demolishing some wings at the Hooters casino, immediately prior to which I fell victim to a douchetastic runner-runner wheel to have my 77 crushed by the mighty 44). I was buzzed the whole time, having started drinking mimosas at around 9:30 AM while playing Pai Gow with a terribly witty old broad who dropped this bomb on the table describing her current physique -

I finally got myself a body made for a bikini, and now I can't find anyone to press the wrinkles out of my birthday suit.

And that was worth the price of admission right there. So after my morning Pai Gow/Mimosa session, I went over the Rio to meet Stb for lunch, and we saw Badblood walking by, so he jumped the handrail to join us. We meandered through the Rio for a bit, chatted with Pauly and stopped to say hi to the Shrink. We railed Hoy for a few minutes on the way to his cash in the 6-handed NLHE event (congrats, again, bro!), and then went to MGM to play cards. I broke even at $4/8, and continued to drink mimosas for the next four hours, prompting plenty of shit from Stb. He even got the cocktail waitress to call me "Mimosa boy," which got her extra tips from both of us. Then it was time to bowl, which was also my first meeting with Bayne and Irongirl.

Yes. you might note that I haven't linked to anyone. It's not that I don't love everyone, but I'm really, really lazy. I'll work on getting links in, I promise.

MeanHappyGuy showed up, and as he called, he said "I'm bringing a friend, is that cool?" The answer was "of course," and when he showed up, I asked "who's your friend? Cause I know that drunk - that's Brandon!" Yep, MHG's friend was Boathouse Beer Pong Almost-Champion and Mr. Brightside singer to the Stars, Brandon Schaefer! It was good to see Brandon again, and good to meet MHG as well. We had a great bunch for bowling, even though our team lost the bet on the second game. I take the blame firmly on my shoulders, since my 96 in the first game fell to a 62 in the second as my drunkenness increased. I did win a prop bet with Penner when he didn't strike the last frame, though. So it was all g00t. Big Pirate Wes showed up for a bit, then we all went downstairs to teach Astin how to play Pai Gow.

And teach we did. Homeboy picked it up pretty quick, but none of us managed to pick up on Penner the Younger's mad Pai Gow skillz and strategery, which mostly consisted of hitting Quad Aces with a K kicker. And JJ for his low hand! Yeah, he bet the bonus. Yeah, it was a good night. Until they broke our table and moved us to a cooler table because we were winning too much. Between me, Astin and the Penners we were up about a combined $300 playing $10 Pai Gow. Within 15 minutes at our new table every one of us was down to even. I put on my skirt and went to bed, leaving the real world-beating degenerates to fight the power without me.

more coming...including pictures of why we loves us some blogger chicas!