WSOP 2007

Seeing as how friend of the site, The Yellow Knight, just recently returned from playing in the World Series of Poker, I asked him to give us readers a brief rundown of his experiences in Vegas. The following is Part I of his first hand account of the chaos:

So I decided sometime last year after winning some money from a couple of poker tournaments, I would try to aim higher and see if I could catch a larger prize. What better way than the World Series of Poker, the ultimate poker tournament in the world, paying out some ridiculous prize money for all those who placed. Not only would you win lots of money and be part of history, but you had a chance to be on TV as well! But how would I get there considering the buy ins are from $1,500 all the way to the main event at $10,000. On top of that, there is the airfare and hotel stay. Thats a lot of money, and I didnt want to spend that kind of money on gambling.

Well, thank goodness for the internet. Such a thing as online poker has revolutionized the game and has provided opportunities for low stakes players to play for more money than they could really afford. I actually won a considerable amount from online play, which has provided me the bankroll I need to continue a part time hobby in the sport (yes, poker is a sport now). During the pre-seaon, every online poker website has their promotions for players to win an all inclusive package to the WSOP valued at $12,000. Buyin ranged from $1 all the way to $1000. I played mostly in the $20-30 range, spending roughly a total of $1,500 on various sites, but I ultimately won a package through Full Tilt Poker.

So lets jump to my actual trip to Vegas and what the WSOP was like. So I left for Vegas the morning of the tournament, which allowed me time to check into my hotel (Golden Nugget - yes I know its not on the strip but it was all I could afford with the money they gave me), shuttle over to the Rio where the WSOP was held, and register my name for attendance. Keep in mind, it was 120 degrees outside and it was a desert. As soon as I stepped into the Rio, it was madness. There were cameramen, photographers, reporters, spectators, police officers, players, hotel employees, and company promoters everywhere. After waiting 30 mins in line, I registered my name at my poker site's booth and got my registration card, gift bag, and monogram logo sticker to wear on my clothes.

ESPN had brought in tons of equipment..media vans, motorized cameras, generators, TV monitors, editing stations, wireless microphones, walkie talkies, lighting, and ESPN promotional booth. On top of that, all the gambling websites and publications were among the crowd handing out free promotional items. As much as I wanted to go around grabbing everything I could, I decided to stay focused and not get caught up in the media frenzy. I came here to win and play my best poker.

So when time came to begin the session of play, they opened the doors to the room where the tournament was being held, which is actually not part of the casino as you may have thought. It is actually a banquet hall in the hotel, and they bring in hundreds of tables and setup cameras for easy filming. Once you walk in, it is like a sea of people moving about from table to table. Every table is assigned a dealer, and every 5 tables is assigned a floor manager. I walk around to see if there is any celebrities amongst the mix, and there were none that I could spot within the first 15 mins. The demographics consisted of college kids, middle aged men, and very few females.

To be continued...

Friday Floetry x 7/13/07

Well, I'm off to Chi-town this weekend. In honor of that, I thought I would put up some Floetry from someone raised in Chicago (although he was born in the ATL). I thought for a quick minute about some Floetry from Iowa or South Dakota, but couldn't come up with anything on the fly. So, I settled on this one. A few notes before today's Floetry. First, "Dame" refers to "Dame Dash" or Damon Dash. Dash co-found Roc-A-Fella records with Shawn "Jay-Z" Carter and Kareem "Biggs" Burke. About 3 years ago, Dash sold his interest in the company for various reasons depending on whom you believe. Jay-Z calls himself the "Hov" as in Jehovah. The artist of this week's Floetry is Kanye West, otherwise known as K. West, Big K, or the self-proclaimed "International A**hole". Many people probably have heard of Kanye West either through his individual records, his producing work for some of Roc-A-Fella's finest, or for those 7 words (or so) he said after Hurricane Katrina. Sure, he might have thrown a tantrum like he was 3 years old (after not winning on a certain awards show), but " you gotta love it though somebody still speaks from his soul" (another part of the Diamonds song which I decided not to present here).

Floetry:

You know who you can call you gotta best believe it
The Roc stand tall and you would never believe it
Take your diamonds and throw'em up like you bulimic
Yea the beat cold but the flow is anemic
After debris settles and the dust get swept off
Big K pick up where young Hov left off
Right when magazines wrote Kanye West off
I dropped my new s*it sound like the best of
A&R's lookin' like "pssh we messed up"
Grammy night, damn right, we got dressed up
Bottle after bottle till we got messed up
In the studio, where really though, yea he next up
People askin' me if I'm gon' give my chain back
That'll be the same day I give the game back
You know the next question dog "Yo, where Dame at?"
This track the Indian dance to bring our reign back
"What's up with you and Jay, man, are y'all ok man?"
They pray for the death of our dynasty like Amen


Taken from Diamonds From Sierra Leone by Kanye West

Party all the time

I know I often say mean things about Houston and its party scene, but I have to say, there are times when I love it. And one of those times is when a large crowd of acquaintances get together...tonight is Thursday and I just wanted to remind everyone that tonight is the night you should be going out. All night. Maybe to Armadillo Palace or Pub...who knows. But I promise both will be great.
So go out! I wont be in town next Thursday, so you will miss me if you dont come tonight. :)

Oh and just to comment on the 777 party, my shots are fantastic and the reason some ended up on the floor and my shirt and the fridge is becuase Judz needs to buy a new cocktail shaker. So the food, folks, and drinks were great and the music and lights were icing on the birthday cake!

Sporting Events From Last Night

There were two main goings-on in the world of sports last night: (1) an exhibition baseball game that carries more weight than it really should and (2) a fantastic soccer game that ended on a controversial call. I must admit that I generally do not give a rats ass about the Major League Baseball All-Star Game (but please tune in to ESPN2 tonight at 6:30pm CT (7:30 ET) to watch the Triple-A All-Star Game as you may recognize a certain last name when they announce the umpiring crew - and if you are in the Houston area, Judz and Brownie will be at the BW-3s in Midtown around 6) since they created this whole home field advantage for the world series goes to the winning league. I liked the game so much more when just about every player got to play a little and starters weren't playing into the 6th inning. I simply don't understand why HFA cannot be determined by the team with the best record. So, I only caught snippets of the game (and unfortunately, one of those was the atrocious national anthem by crooner Chris Isaak and some other dude) and thus, missed the ending where a Philadelphia Phillie flied out against an Los Angeles Angel of Anaheim pitcher. I am sure the Mets/Braves/Brewers/Dodgers/Padres players are so happy that a Phillie (or should LaRussa actually showed up to manage the game, Albert Pujols, a Cardinal with a slim chance of making the playoffs) may have lost HFA for them. Supposedly, it was an exciting conclusion.

Instead, I was watching the first semifinal of the Copa America tournament between Brazil and Uruguay. Let's just say that although Uruguay had numerous chances to take out the Brazilians, they did get screwed on that final penalty kick. My recollection of the rule (I was a soccer referee since I was 13 and all the way through college) states that a goalkeeper may not leave his line before the shooter has touched the ball (if I am wrong, please correct me). Referees have been very lax on this rule, especially for Brazil, especially back in the 1994 World Cup when Brazil faced Italy in the championship game. The Brazilian goalkeeper did the same thing back then as the new one did last night. What is worse is that it appeared that the assistant referee called to have the penalty reshot, but for some reason, the game ended. The announcer on GolTV (please somebody tell me where he is from - I am calling him Welsh because you don't see many Welsh people and they are cool and his accent didn't sound British, Scottish or Irish, so I selected the remaining British Isle) agrees with me and he was going @pe$h!t. Hopefully the winner of tonight's Argentina-Mexico match will go on and defeat the cheaters from Brazil.

Sicko - Movie Review

Before delving into this movie review, I must provide a little disclosure that may have some influence on my review. First, I do lean right on a number of social issues. Second, I have a brain that I occasionally use. Onto the review.

Overall, this was an important movie, just like all of Michael Moore's other films that discussed a subject that will hopefully lead to intelligent discourse and hopefully some change for the better. My biggest problem with Michael Moore and his movies is that he is so overly one-sided that he is either preaching to the converted or he is considered a hack. The key to getting the middle of the road people to come to your side and see your point is if you are fair and balanced. It is not illegal to say that there are things that are right about the healthcare system. Further, it is a shame what happened to many of the people that were focused on in the movie, but there are millions and millions more people that are perfectly satisfied with their healthcare and insurance. Let's be honest, the people who are satisfied with their health insurance are not going to want a radical change that may have potential side effects including longer wait times to see a doctor or substandard care. The universal healthcare the movie discussed in other countries is all well and good when you only look at bits and pieces of it. I am sure a filmmaker of similar talents can find similar extreme cases of neglect and poor healthcare in any regulatory environment including those in England, France and Cuba. And seriously, if things were so great in Cuba, why do thousands of Cubans risk their lives everyday to swim/raft to Florida? Mere generalizations and shocking stories about certain outliers are not what this discourse needs. Unfortunately, this is the breadth of Michael Moore's argument. Is the healthcare industry in the US perfect? Hell no, but neither are any of the other ones that were discussed in the movie. There is no doubt that Michael Moore makes good movies that discuss important issues, but by only discussing the extremes, Moore fails in his quest to bring people over to his side. Liberals will absolutely love this movie, while staunch Republicans will blow it off as simple hogwash. I only wish a real filmmaker would tackle the same subject and provide the objective analysis that the American people would need to make an informed decision.

I truly felt the discussions I had with some of my colleagues who I went to the movie with were more engaging than the movie itself, so in that respect Michael Moore continues his role as an important player in politics even if I don't personally agree with him. I truly hope that Mr. Moore uses a percentage of the profits on this film to help those people he showed in the film and the many others who have been screwed over by the industry.

3.5 out of 6 beers.

07-07-07 Party

This past Saturday, Judz opened up his awesome home to his friends, acquantancies and even Bubby to celebrate the fact that it was the seventh day of the seventh month of the year 2007. Why did Judz really host the party? Because in the immortal words of Eddie Murphy, I got "to party all the time, party all the time." To all those poor souls who were either in Iowa, Las Vegas, Amsterdam, or were just unintentionally uninvited, the following is a brief list of what you missed:

• The unexpected, but killer DJ stylings of Alex (yes, he even brought the strobes) until the wee hours of the morning - Good luck in Philly
• The Usual Suspects
• The presence of the Dilla Crew
• Judz Almost-World Famous Queso
• A brief field trip to Kobain's
• Copa America QFs in the background
• Natty Light
• Powdered Sugar's Almost-Houston Famous Blue Shots (at least those that didn't fall to the ground)
• Birthday cake and Champagne

Copious amounts of fun were had by all and if you have any other thoughts or just periods of time that you cannot recall and need help filling in the gaps, feel free to leave comments and if you have pictures, please email them to me and I will try to figure out how to upload them (with the photographer's consent, of course).

Movies You Should Have Seen By Now - #2

Star Wars: Episode IV - A New Hope (and all of its prequels and sequels)

It was released thirty years ago, yet I still hear people who say they have never seen it. It has the second highest domestic gross of all time (behind Titanic [shudders]) and has made over $460 million in its box office run, not to mention the money it has made worldwide and on vhs/dvd. Behind George Lucas, it put Industrial Light & Magic on the map and in this day and age, very few movies being made with any kind of special effects can say that they have not at least been influenced by what the ILM team has done. It was ranked #13 on AFI's latest top 100 movies of all time. It has one of the most famous and recognizable characters in Darth Vader and has the most famous cult character of all time in Boba Fett. Further, it now has two sequels, three prequels and has spawned countless books, direct to video movies, tv specials, etc. At this point, I am just dumbfounded that there are still people out there that have not seen this movie. If you are one of them, (1) please leave me a comment as to why you have not seen it and (2) GO SEE THE FRICKIN THING ALREADY.

Weekly Review

Fourth of July provides a special time to hang out with friends, bar-b-que and mix your own drinks. Watching fireworks is a cheap way to enjoy an evening. I think this is also a great time to catch up on the summer movies. I saw Rataouille (adorable) and Evening (not good) as well as Knocked Up (hilarious) this week. So my weekly bar review is only going to include my Tuesday and Thursday night.
Tuesday we went to the Hernan Catteneo show at Bar Rio...this guy can mix like no one else. It was in fact the best show I have seen to date. Tiesto is coming up soon though and last year he was on my top 3 for the year. But regardless, Hernan can put it on. Go and download some of his music. It will definately get any party moving.
Thursday I started up at Pub Fiction just like the old days. Same crowd, young guys watching sports and checking out the ladies. Pub is one of my favorites, mainly becuase I know bartenders pretty well and get most of my drinks on the house. But Thursday is 80s night, so the music is awesome. This Thursday was a crazy one (as previously noted in my Friday blog). We started at Pub, then hit up Tipsy Clover, then on to Whiskey Creek and finally ended up at Bond. Tipsy is the same old place. Casual crowd, hanging out, ok drinks, etc. I ran into a very old friend, so I was pretty distracted the entire time. Whiskey is not where you want to go on Thursdays. No one was there and they also played 80s music, so you might as well go to Pub. Bond was cool. I was pretty drunk by this time though, after tequila shots, multiple drinks, and a few beers I dont remember much about Bond other than dancing around. Hardly anyone else was dancing though. So I probalby only had fun becuase I was drunk. I think I remember the crowd being somewhat snobby with a hint of ghetto. I am against Bond in general though, it has gone downhill like crazy. Fights occur there (I personally saw one right in front of my face). So I would NEVER recommend going to Bond. If you want a weekend spot for dancing, try going accross the street. It might not be completely packed, but they have great music.