Entered the 11am $65 buy-in MGM tournament on Wed and Thu. All the reviews are accurate - these guys are professional, helpful and have their act together. I personally find the doubling blinds every 20 minutes a bit stifling for true poker playing in the later rounds (could just be bitter grapes as I made final table but got short stacked and beat by 2-4 against my A-K!!!!). For those on a time schedule this tourney usually ends around 2pm.

Also played the cash game which had the typical 60/20/20 spread of Tourists, annoying gum-chewing gold-chaining hat-wearing I wanna be Phil Ivey 20 locals twenty somethings and the balance local rocks/off-shift dealers. I played for several hours on the $2-$5 NL (100-500 buyin) table and found a sufficient amount of dead money and good play to make it entertaining.

Also played the cash games at Mandalay. The $4-$8 1/2 kill game was fun with a slightly more adult crowd than the MGM but I HATE LIMIT. I absolutley killed them and after about 90 minutes had only increased my $200 buyin to $400. Next night played the $2-$4 NL $200 buyin table. They run this well (although without the niceties of video line boards at the MGM) and keep a must-move table going to ensure full tables at the rest of the no-limit action. Caught a good table again with typical mix of 30-50 old farts like me and annoying college or more likely ex-college wunderbrats.

Particularly satisfying was seeing a couple of twenty somethings at my table with about $800 each drinking the bottom half of Monte Carlo plastic football drinks. Yes they were quite merry and according to an LA clever player next to me had caught a huge rush of cards. Long story short - I did indeed catch all their chips about 20 minutes after my LA buddy bought them Jaegermeister shots. Had to run for my redeye but in 3 hours turned my $200 buyin into $1400. Yeehaw!