So I decided to head to Vegas for a few days by myself...a chance for a single guy to pursue his only love interest over Valentines...poker! :-) My recommendation is this...if you are single then playing poker on Valentine's in Las Vegas is not for you...or me either!!!

Day 1 (Monday, Feb 13) - I was staying at Caesars and arrived at the hotel about 11AM and promptly registered for the noon tourney. As many others have mentioned, the 4500 in starting chips and 40 minute rounds provide as good a structure as anywhere else in town. I caught a lot of premium starting hands early but was only able build a pot when my KK went up against a short-stacks JJ (3rd time in 20 minutes he caught JJ) and knocked him out of the tourney. Instead, I had to use position and some luck hitting flops to build my stack to around 10,000 chips at the break. Looking around the room it had me in the Top 10 (5th or 6th) as level 3 started with 100-200 blinds and a 25 ante. However, this is when things headed south for me. Twice I called a raise from EP or MP and I was in LP with AK off only to find that I was up against AA 2 times and the case A hit the flop and all the money ended up in the middle. However, it was against short stacks both times and was still alive with about 4500 in chips as we entered Level with 200-400 blinds and a 50 ante. This time there is an EP limper and I picked up AKs and move in hoping to pick up the 1600 only to find out that he limped KK!!! Oh well...that was a fun tourney!

Next it was over to Aladdin to play in the $60 7PM tourney. While waiting for the tourney to start I sat down at the 1/2NL $200 max game. Only hand of significance was having a new player that just sat down in EP limp for $2, SB calls, and I have AA and make it $20 to go. Our hero in EP calls and SB folds. Flop A-J-6 (two diamonds) and I bet out $30 and EP calls. Turn is a 4 clubs and I move in for my remaining $68 ($102 in the pot) and EP calls. River is a black Q. I turn up my AA and EP turns up K-10 of spades...DOH!!! There went $100 of fun! The tourney has a decent starting stack of 2000 chips but after the 1st hour it forces every short stack all-in preflop and by the FT every person at the table except 1 was having to resort to all-in being their only move. I split 1st place 4-ways here so I can't complain. The tourney was a mix of average players, a few locals, and a fair amount of newbies who had never played in a tourney before.

I wandered over to Bellagio about 11PM to "check out the scenery" and decided to play some 4/8 LHE because their was no wait. (I wanted to hop into the 1/2NL or 3/6LHE at Paris but they had about an hour wait). It definitely took me a bit to adjust to the game and my $200 was down to about $80 in an hour after I missed EVERY flop that I saw. I didn't win a pot for close to 3 hours but once I did things turned out all right. I played until the game started to break up close to 3AM and finished up about $60 for the night.

Day 1 results...$130 loss (Caesars), $150 loss (Aladdin 1/2), $400 won (Aladdin tourney), $60 won (Bellagio 4/8) = $160 profit for Monday.

Day 2 (Tuesday, Feb 14)...ahh welcome to my day from hell at the poker tables. There is nothing more frustrating than being on top of your game only to go card dead for 15 hours!!! I again played the Caesars noon tourney and couldn't buy a pot to save my life. My first table was full of a bunch of "TV Poker Heroes" who LOVED to limp and check/call and then move all-in on the turn and/or river any time you bet. It was craziness indeed but with the lengthy rounds I didn't want to risk my stack to call them down. Maybe I should have because I lost about half my stack when they would make these plays. I survived the first two levels...barely!! I made it two hands into the second hour only to move my tiny stack in with A/Q only to have the short stack in the BB have A/K. Bye Bye me!!!

Went over to the Wynn in the afternoon to play some more 4/8 LHE. If the Caesars tourney was any indication...things were going headed south...and FAST!!! I sat at a new table where I was at least 30 years younger (I'm only 22) than the next "youngest" person at my table. It was table of older tourists who were all rocks except for one Asian guy who was a calling station. I started on a nice rush and was up to about $150 early...but then it was a 4 hour bleeding session after that. The hands that I would pick up started becoming 2nd best but those were few and far between. $250 in the hole and 3 Grey Goose and tonics later (I never drink at the table but had to do SOMETHING to pass the time)...I headed back to Caesars for a romantic Valentines dinner for one.

I fell asleep in my room about 9PM but awoke about 2AM and decided to head downstairs. There was a Rentway in convention in town and I had heard that they had a lot of guys getting drunk and donating late at night so I had to go investigate. The rumors were correct as I sat at a 3/6 table with 5 guys (4 of them were HEAVILY intoxicated) who were just giving away their money. Things again started off ok and I ran my $120 up to about $170 in a little over an hour. At this point, 3 of the Rentway guys were busted and the other two had turned their $100 starting stacks into $400 and $800 respectively. Player A with the $400 ended up leaving at about 4AM once he was down to about $150 and most of his money had moved into Player B's stack. The game stayed 7 handed after that with me and 2 other guys looking to pick off Player B and a bf/gf couple that were new to the game and willing to chase all the way down. By now Player B was playing EVERY hand and announced to the table that it was time for him to give all this money back...and that he did as he was down to about $150 when he finally sobered up enough to leave the table about 9AM. Sadly enough for me, I was still card dead and my few decent hands couldn't hold up against 3 calling stations and I too left about 9AM having lost another $120.

Day 2 Results - $130 loss (Caesars), $250 loss (Wynn), $120 loss (Caesars) = $500 loss for Tuesday/Wednesday morning

Day 3 saw me decide to take a break from the felt and head out to Hoover Dam with a bunch of Canadians and Germans. It was a fun trip and I am glad I took the trip. I was going to dinner @ Bellagio and then to see "O" so I only had a little bit more time to play after I got back to town. I went by Luxor and played for about an hour at the 1/2 NL game. I was placed at the table full of locals (these guys play together EVERY day I found out) so I started off playing tight looking to double up the $50 you can start with. Fortunately I picked up AA in the BB and was able to double through against a guy with A/J. I finished my hour of play up $100 when I was able to get action on two straights that I flopped (the board was 3 of the same suit and fortunately didn't bring a 4th to complete my opponents flush draw.)

Day 3 Results - $100 profit at Luxor

Overall Results

$160 Profit (Monday)
$500 Loss (Tuesday)
$100 Profit (Wednesday)

$240 Net Loss

So what can we all learn from my misery??? If you are single...don't go playing poker in Las Vegas on Valentine's Day!!! ;-)