Drove in early Thursday 6/3 from LA with a pal, made it in about 4 hours. Met 5 friends there, one was our poker group's player of the year which entitled her to entry into a $1500 event. We stayed at IP, cheap and centrally located are its only redeeming qualities as most know, only played some uneventful 2/4 LHE there.

Drove straight to the Rio to check out the WSOP room and perhaps a SNG, but the cheaper ones weren't filling up (11 am on Thurs) and so we just walked around. I've never been to the WS b4 so I really enjoyed taking in what one friend described as Disneyland for poker players.

To the Hard Rock for an afternoon tourney, but after about an hour (I lost two bucks at a NL cash game which I typically don't play but that's all they had, my friend likes it, and we had an hour to kill) I got up to ask about the tourney as friend thought you needed a card to play there and they say they're having a charity tourney today. Lesson learned about trusting CardPlayer mag on the tourneys and I'd have been quite pissed off if I had lost anything big at the NL game waiting for a tourney that wasn't going to happen.

From there, we went to TI where a friend of a friend was playing. Entered the $50, 48 entries including the re-entries, and tight play and a re-raise of my tens from a pair of sixes got me deep in the tourney. Final table goes down to 6, with five paid. We put in $10 each for the bubble and soon we were down to 5, then 4. I passed on the deal offer as I was the big stack (didn't want to be a jerk, but didn't seem like a good deal for me and I just got there and wanted to play). Other guys were cool with it. My only suck out of that tourney was a push with A5 against AK, hitting the 5 and knocking out the short stack that wanted the deal. Heads up I had a sizable lead, that evaporated due to bad luck and an ill-timed bluff and once we were about even, my opponent offered a chop which I gladly took for $500, not wanting to flip a coin for the $270 or so and a bit shell-shocked from the last couple of hands.

I'm a 2/4, 3/6 LHE and small stakes tourney player, but the win had me thinking about a shot at the WSOP. Up and down at some limit the rest of the day at the Palms (won)and IP (lost) and day one ended up about $450.

Thoughts of the WS diminished on Day 2 as I didn't cash at one tourney at Planet Hollywood and the 7 or 11 at the Sahara. Got down to 2 table out of 5 or so in the PH, and 2 tables of 8 or 9 in the 11 at the Sahara, but exited early in the 7 just after the break. I was doing ok and playing very tight as I usually do. In the first hour my only hand of significance was when 4 limpers to me and I get KK at 75/150 blinds. A raise to 750 and they all folded with a couple of whispers of "he hasn't played a hand" indicating their belief. Still a nice pot, but I wonder if 600 would have had the desired heads up result. Of course, there was likely a scary ace waiting on the flop.

So after the break, remembering my tight reputation, I raised in late position with nobody but the blinds in the hand to 600 with blinds of 100/200 and my donkey K9. Two callers. Flop of 234 with two clubs (I had none) caused me to continuation bet just shy of the pot. One guy believed, one guy hung on. Unfortunate King on the turn left the board with two clubs and two hearts. I go all in for a touch over the pot hoping to force out the flush draw. Think, think, think, call and he shows Q5 clubs. Open ended and flush draw. 6d on the river and I'm done.

End of day 2, up $275.

A couple of sidenotes on Day 2. The WSOP entry was playing while the rest of were in the PH tourney with again about 50. All 5 of us were still alive with 20 to go and I had visions of us all meeting at the Final Table. Unfortunately only one did and he was the first FT casualty.

During the tourney, we got one text from the WS player saying she was 2 hours in, had about 2/3 of her stack left, was playing at a very aggresive table, and had seen 5 players go. Second text came an hour or two later, she's gone. JJ three times and were not kind.

Last day, two others (a husband and wife) played the $1000 event for that weekend. Having missed our other friend's participation we took the shuttle from Harrah's over to check out the tourney. That room full was quite a site, we saw Phil Gordon and several other pros I recognized but didn't know by name. Glad to see it live for a few minutes, but of course poker isn't much of a spectator sport without a pocket cam. We watched the wife play awhile uneventfully and then the husband who told us he lost half his stack in the first hand on either a very lucky turn or a very aggresive and/or ballsy bluff. He was done in 47 minutes, she in about 4 hours.

Back to PH for one final tourney and down to 12 players, I have that "I need to make a move pretty soon" feeling when it was made for me by a guy with AQ and I looked down to find AA. That double up got me easily to the final table again where I finished 4th for a tad over $300.

Made somewhere around $450 for the trip, covering food, hotel and gas with some to spare. More than that, I just love poker and it was so fun to play.

Also visited Aria, but only one limit game going and after 45 minutes I went to bed, but it looked like a nice room.

My friend, who is a pretty good player I think, got beat up for three days by the flops and/or some pretty lucky/bad play and I gave him the don't change your game speech.

Been awhile since I've posted here, but continue to love the site, especially when I'm about to go the Vegas!