Dazed and Confused: Day 3 at the WPT Championships

I am the Eggman, so I decided to valet at the Bellagio. I deserved the right not to park my rental car and take advantage of the free service. I guess I had been in Hollyweird too long that I had gotten used to the valet-centric lifestyle. Even the Ralph's in Change100's Beverly Hills neighborhood had a valet. I know, that makes me sick... a valet at the friggin' supermarket!

I arrived at the Bellagio much earlier for Day 3 of the WPT Championships. I took my time navigating the narrow aisles and snapping photos while looking for the luscious Carmel Petresco's table. I wanted to stalk her all afternoon, and take a few spankworthy photos for my thousands of horny readers. But I never could find her. The room was somewhat quiet aside from the clattering of the chips and the faint cry of "Cocktails? Cocktails?" from the busty Bellagio waitresses. Most of the media was spread out between the historic Fontana Room and the actual poker room, where they used a good twenty or so tables for the 473 players who started Day 3.

When I wandered around the poker room, I took a pic of Doyle Brunson sporting a big white Stetson. Evelyn Ng and TJ Cloutier played at the same table. I saw Max Pescatori with a short stack. He would end up getting busted early when his pocket Aces lost to Bradley Berman's K-K. Berman caught a four flush on the Italian Pirate and he got bounced on the worst Bad Beat of the Day. On Day 2, Liz Lieu had Aces cracked by Kings.

The Bellagio security added ropes in front of the Fontana Room to clear the clusterfuck from the previous two days. The railbirds flocked to the area in front of the Fontana Room where they gawked and sought autographs and tried to take pictures. When Daniel Negreanu busted out early, he quickly left the Fontana Room with a bag filled with homemade food from his Romanian mother.

"Daniel!" one lady shouted. She weighed about 350 pounds and the casino floor shook as she rumbled at Negreanu like a charging rhinoceros. "You have to sign my hat!"

A young black kid with a camera asked for a photo.

"Make it quick," Negreanu said as he eyed about thirty or so vultures with digital, disposable and cell phone cameras swarming his way.

As soon as the photo was over, Negreanu bolted through a row of $1 slot machines as a trail of autograph hounds followed behind him. The guy just busted out of a tournament and the last thing he wants to do is sign autographs for twenty minutes while he's bombarded with the same stupid questions.

Spaceman and I hit the hooker bar at the first break. He drank a Newcastle and I opted for a SoCo on the rocks which came with a call to AlCantHang for a dial-a-shot. AlCantHang was still at work and I got his voicemail. At that point, a slew of phone calls starting coming from the East Coast. It was 4:20 EST and all my pothead friends, fellow Deadheads and Phisheads all called up to wish me a Happy 420 Day. I even wore my Steal Your Face hat in honor of the special day. It's sorta become a national holiday for potheads in order to draw attention away from the fact that April 20th is both Hitler's birthday and the anniversary of the Columbine Massacre.

"Mmmm.... he's walking sex," one unidentified female member of the media said about the young Patrik Antonius. He has been a model in Finland before he became a professional poker player. "Sex on a stick. Definitely."

Despite the boyish good looks of the young European players, I spotted another female member of the media who once offered me free sex in exchange for me writing one of her assignments that was close to deadline.

"What a shame. Prostitution for journalistic sake?" a perplexed Friedman said when I recanted that random night when I was offered a booty call for my writing skills.

Spaceman and Sharla were hanging out in one corner of the room next to the podium which the WPT live updates crew took over. CardPlayer had a team of reporters with a video crew and the radio crew occupying two tables near the stage. The PokerWire girls had one table and the rest of the media had to sit outside on the verandah or find space on the couches.

There were about ten more media reps I never met before wandering around. The newbies are easy to spot. They have badges that say "Day Pass" instead of one with your printed name and affiliation. I had two fucktards who were walking in front of me while I took photos. That's a huge pet peeve of mine... having a fuckin' rookie ruin a shot of Action Dan picking his nose because he walked in front of me instead of waiting a second or walking behind me.

During one of the breaks, Spaceman pointed out Capt. Tom Franklin's shirt that said, "I got blown by Katrina." I believe Capt. Tom lives down in the coastal Mississippi area.

Kenna James sat at a table nearby and bought drinks for everyone. He also bought lunch from PF Changs for a few media reps and players at his table. He was in a good mood and too bad he didn't last through the evening, otherwise Spaceman would have been drinking free all night.

I heard that the owner of Poker Pages called up one of the media liaisons for the WPT and demanded that they kick out former employee Steve Hall who had been sporting a Poker Pages press badge. Steve was covering the WPT Championships for Martin's Poker and was allowed access but his Poker Pages badge was confiscated and he was given a new one that said "Day Pass." His old badge was tossed in the garbage can.

I spotted James Woods, my main man Freddy Deeb, and Johnny Chan all sitting up front. That was actually bad because the lighting is the weakest in the front of the Fontana Room. I did my best and focused on the tables near the windows that was illuminated by natural light.

I wandered over to the conservatory to take some pictures of the spring floral arrangement. They had a weird insect theme and included a cage full of butterflies from all over the world.

As I shot the shit on the verandah with different members of the media, the infamous water show started as the fountains went off. It was a reminder that I was fortunate enough not to have to work in a cubicle, instead I got to call the Bellagio my office for a week. And that constantly rotated from tournament to tournament.

I saw the chick that Spaceman can't stand and I don't blame him. Some folks take themselves too seriously and she's one of them. I finally realized after a year that you need to have a light hearted approach to working at a poker tournament. I discovered the fun again by not taking myself so seriously. I also captured a rare rainbow on camera as the Bellagio fountains danced. It has nothing to do with poker, but was a rare moment and I'm shocked that I caught it on camera.

I chatted with William Rockwell in the hallway and he spoke about being able to act like a gentleman at the tables.

"Be a gracious loser and a humble winner," he added.

Too bad that's not what the producers want. Nice guys are boring for TV. There was one table in particular that could have been the scene for an explosion. Phil Hellmuth and Mike Matusow sat at the same table. They both kept relatively quiet and there were no major disruptions. Matusow was eventually knocked out by Hellmuth without any huge verbal tirades from either player.

Here are some of the better pics I took on Day 3:


A sleepy Dan Harrington calculates his M


The always sassy Joanne "JJ" Liu


Shirt of the Day: Capt. Tom wins!




Happy 420 Day, Phil!

About 2/3 of the field is gone. Out of 606 players, 204 remain at the end of Day 3. Patrik Antonius from Finland is the chipleader with actor James Woods sitting pretty in 15th place. James Woods made a run after he cracked the Hilton Sisters with a set of 9s. Plenty of big names are left. Make sue you stop by Poker Player Newspaper to read my bland end of day recaps. The top 100 players win prize money, so it's going to be an interesting Friday. I wonder if we'll bust the money bubble? Ideally they want to get down to 27 players at the end of Saturday... so 175 or so players have to be eliminated over the next two days.

Flipchip should be stopping by the Bellagio on Friday to snap some of the best damn photos in the poker industry. Hopefully he'll post some of them either here or over at Las Vegas and Poker Blog.

I left the Bellagio early again and on my way out tipped the pimple-faced kid at the valet $5 for bringing my car somewhat quick. I had another excellent dinner with Friedman in Summerlin again, this time at Kilroy's, a burger joint on Charleston and Buffalo that had one of the best burgers I have ever eaten in Las Vegas. It was over $8 and worth it. The catch is that it does not come with fries so you have to get a side order so it jacks up the price a bit. Their specialty is burgers and they were voted Best Burger in Las Vegas by some publication. I wanted a three-cheese burger and asked if I could get that with bacon.

"No!" emphatically shouted our waitress, who looked like a 45 year old version of Cheri O'Teri jacked up on Greyhounds and one too many Ritalins.

"It's too expensive. Bacon cost three bucks. Order a bacon burger and add cheese. You'll save money that way."

I agreed but after she left I was pissed. I hate it when servers talk you out of getting exactly what you wanted. I got a bacon cheeseburger with cheddar cheese when I specifically asked for a three-cheese bacon burger initially but got cockblocked by our freaky waitress.


My favorite pic of the day: Rainbow outside of the Bellagio
I will not be liveblogging anything about the WPT Championships until the final table begins on Monday night around 5 pr 6pm PCT. In the meantime, I'm using my time at the Bellagio wisely(drinking, gambling, bullshitting with pros, gossiping with my friends in the media, checking out the hot railbirds) and I discovered that you get to see and experience more aspects of the tournament when you are wandering around instead of being glued to a laptop in the corner updating chipcounts like a spider monkey jacked up on crack. I'll post more pictures soon. Stay tuned.

Rebirth

"Money, get away. Get a good job with good pay and you're okay." - Roger Waters

I thought L.A. traffic was bad. Las Vegas traffic is getting ridiculous. Without traffic, it's 15 minutes from Grubby's apartment in Henderson to the Bellagio. It took me almost ninety minutes when I got stuck in the bottleneck of 215 merging with 15. Then I got fucked on Las Vegas Blvd. stuck in a standstill behind a new double decker city bus. I ended up listening to an entire set of Galactic from their epic Mardi Gras show at Tipitina's in New Orleans and parts of Widespread Panic's Halloween show from a few months ago. As the music kept me mellow and away from traffic tilt, an endless stream of pedestrians five and six deep walked in front of the Bellagio fountains as I waited for twelve minutes to reach the entrance. I can't wait until they open up their new parking deck and I can take the super shortcut the backway via Frank Sinatra Drive.

The Bellagio's security guards stop you before you enter the self-parking. They ask to look into your trunk before you can pass. I wonder what they expect to find? It's the illusion of safety and that allows people to sleep at night and feel more comfortable losing their money at the Bellagio since it's terrorist free.

The lower levels were all packed and I had to park up near the top. That's an indication that people are losing money at an astounding rate. Everytime I've been to the Bellagio over the past six years, it's been packed. Mid-afternoons at the Bellagio are populated with sunburnt tourists with digital cameras snapping multiple photos of the aromatic flower conservatory and the psychedelic Chihuly ceiling sculpture in the lobby. After covering several events at the Bellagio and playing in the poker room for a plethora of sessions, I know the floor layout fairly well, which includes the shortcut from the parking garage to the Fontana Room. You still have to navigate the lobby filled with slow-walking sightseers. Some actually go into the casino and lose their money. Most of them don't take the bait and just snap photos then leave.

As I got close to the Fontana Room, I pulled my press badge out of my sports coat. I wore jeans and my Vermont hockey t-shirt. I threw the jacket on to look slightly more classy and like an official member of the media, instead of a hack blogger with too many spelling errors and delusions of grandeur. I had a camera slung around my shoulder with a pad and pen in one pocket and my voice recorder in the other. I didn't bring a laptop since I wasn't going to be doing any live blogging. It felt good traveling light. With so much media cover the WPT these days, I figured what's the point? It's like forty squirrels chasing after the same nut, or forty horny guys trying to fuck the same girl.

Besides, with all the lackluster coverage out there from new and old media outlets (including some I've never even heard of before) it might make my previous work stand out even more. Besides, I was taking a new approach to covering tournaments... less work and more fun.

"I never show up on day one anyway," I told Spaceman when he called me this morning wondering when I was going to show up.

"You're the Phil Hellmuth of the media. You come late and still win," he joked.

So I skipped the first day of action on Tuesday to stay at home and write all day. My strategy was to spend more and more time at the Bellagio as the tournament progresses. With 90 minute levels and $50K in chips to start, sitting around waiting for something to happen in the first three days of a seven day tournament is like trying to watch water boil. I've covered enough tournaments to know it's worthless for me to live blog anything until the last three tables. My goal was to take photos and talk to pros and my friends in the media.

I spotted a crowd of poker fans and enthusiasts milling around the front of the Fontana Room like a a rabid circle of vultures ready to devour a dying carcass. A few random poker pros smoked cigarettes near slot machines and I quickly realized that they were on a break. I spotted Jen Harman taking photos with a few fans as they whipped out their cell phones and took several blurry photos.

"One more photo Jen, please! You're my favorite poker player!"

More fans circled around Marcel Luske, sporting a $4,000 tailored suit from London. Marcel always looks like a million bucks and always accomodates picture requests. He had his arm around two fans on each side of him as he blinked when the flash went off from one of the cameras. The Unabomber posed in front of a dozen tourists as they snapped photos like a drunken menagerie of Japanese businessmen. I elbowed and sidestepped my way past the carnage towards the entrance of the Fontana Room. It was a cluster fuck there too, with players leaving and entering and fans gawking and relatives of players trying to get quick updates. The geniuses who set up the tournament decided to place a souvenir stand right in front of the entrance to maximize profits, but made it almost impossible to get by. I walked past the embankment of star gazing tourists hopelessly cluthcing sharpies and random poker magazines and desperately seeking autographs from their favorite pros.

I flashed my press badge to the large security guards in the maroon blazers. They didn't blink as I walked right by them. I took two steps into the Fontana Room when Spaceman and Joy stopped me. They were on their way out.

"Wanna get a drink?"

I've been on the job for less than thirty seconds before we hit the bar right in front of the Fontana Room. Late night it's usually filled with working girls, but at 3:30pm on a Wednesday, it was packed with poker people. As we sat down, Scotty Nguyen was getting up. He had a drink in one hand and some serious bling dangled around his neck.

"Scotty my man," I said as I shook his hand.

"What's up baby?" he quickly answered.

We ordered beers and I considered a SoCo, but declined at the last second. The SoCo meant a commitment to serious drinking. I can't just have one of those and if I did I get sucked into a dozen of dial-a-shots. I can hit and run with a beer and picked a Corona. I paid for the first round, $21 for three beers. I tossed $25 on the video poker machine in front of me and the bartender swooped it up. I thanked Joy again for getting me into the Playboy Mansion. She told me that I could come back again next year. Joy fuckin' rules. I made a secret pact with myself to buy her drinks whenever I see her for the remainder of both our lives.

I spotted Steve Hall who told me he was working for Martin's Room. He pointed out where Liz Lieu was sitting. After our drinks we stood out front for a few minutes. I saw Gavin Smith who was busted yesterday. His shot at winning Player of the Year is in jeopardy if The Grinder and Barry Greenstien do well at the WPT Championships. I began to see random people wearing press badges that I had never seen before. That's how it's been this year. Every event more and more squirrels are showing up trying to hump the same nut.

Steve Rosenbloom appeared out of nowhere as he stepped out of the dense crowd.

"It's good to see you Pauly," he said as he shook my hand and chewed gum at the same time, "Nice of you to end your early retirement."

Word got out in the media that I had been skipping events. Somehow my hiatus got blown into a rumor that I quit which was partially correct. At any rate, it was an honor to be missed by Rosenbloom. He's the only legitimate journalist covering poker today. I'll always have images of him at the 2005 WSOP, chomping on a cigar and sipping a glass of scotch in the hallway of the Rio writing his column because the media room was jam packed with media types the majority of which couldn't even write a coherent paragraph, let alone snap a decent photo.

The rest of us media reps are two-bit shysters and hacks compared to Steve Rosenbloom. He's still a Chicago Tribune columnist with a syndicated poker column in over 50 national newspapers. He also has a book out called The Best hand I Ever Played. He's covered baseball, hockey, and even the Chicago Bulls during their halcyon championship years.

And he gave me some amazing advice about writing and dealing with incompetent superiors.

"Get to them before they get to you!"

I asked him how he never went crazy in all the years he's covered sports under the biggest scrutiny and immense pressure of writing for the Tribune.

"I love what I do and realize there are a thousand guys who would kill me to get my job," he said straight up. "And poker is great because the players are much more interesting that professional athletes."

He pretty much summed up why I should be grateful for what I do and he shined a light on the aspects of my good fortune and position in the poker media. In short, he told me to have fun with what I'm doing and don't be afraid to pitch exactly what I want to do to my editors.

Spaceman, Rosenbloom and I ended up talking about sports for a good twenty minutes. We started on baseball and he told us a few tales about covering the California Angels back in the 1980s. The topic quickly got steered to the upcoming NHL playoffs and we marveled at my NY Rangers implosion and about how hot the NJ Devils have been playing. Rosenbloom thought that it could be possible to see a Devils and Redwings Stanley Cup. Sure, the Redwings have to get past Edmonton, but I understood where he was coming from. Oh, and before I left the Bellagio, I went to the sportsbook and put money on both teams. A tip from Rosenbloom is better than gold.

I decided it was time to actually do some work and I went inside to the Fontana Room. Since the buy-in was $25,000, all the riff-raff were not around. There were a few internet qualifiers and satellite winners, but not as many as the $10K events on the WPT. 606 players entered trying to win the first place prize of $3.7 million. The majority of the entrants were the top pros minus Isabelle Mercier who chose not to play. I saw NYC's Shane Schleger, Erik Seidel, Chau Giang, Huck Seed, Jen Tilly, Per Ummer, and Freddy Deeb right away.

As I went to snap a photo of Evelyn Ng sitting next to Carlos Mortensen, I realized my camera was out of batteries. I made a rookie mistake and forgot to check my batteries before I went to work. Oh well. I turned off the camera and slung it around my shoulder. I decided to talk to my fellow friends in the media who were scattered on couches that encircled the back wall. In previous events, Poker Wire and Cardplayer shared the small desk on a perch. BJ and the girls would let me stash my bag back there and power up my laptop when it ran out of juice. The WPT took that over and over thirty media people were spread out fighting for space. I took pleasure in knowing that I didn't have to worrying about that.

I talked with Jen and Heather from Poker Wire. Jen wondered where my brown jacket went. She went to Duke and I joked around about their lacrosse team. Heather told me about her new apartment in Summerlin as I said "Hi," to Sharla from PokerPages. Spaceman and I wandered out to the patio as Andy Black walked past us with shades sitting upside down on his head. We saw Juha Helpi giving an interview with the WPT crew. In the corner, Gus Hansen conducted an interview as Chau Giang stood outside and chain smoked. He'd smoke a full cigarette, go inside and play a a few hands then come back out for another smoke. He knew it was more important to survive the first day and smoke cigarettes than play too many hands and risk all his chips in the first few levels.

"I thought you were retired?" wondered CardPlayer's Scott Huff as he wandered by.

"Nope. Men's Urology Magazine is paying me $1,200 to write 2K words on the peeing habits of professional gamblers."

The last time I saw Scott Huff was at the Playboy Mansion a few weeks ago. His girlfriend was drinking heavily and tried to talk to the spider monkeys. I spent too much time down there getting wasted myself.

When I walked back inside, the all blonde Liz Lieu smiled and gave me a four fingered hello wave. I wandered over to the Poker Wire girls and chatted with Heather and Amanda.

"We missed you Pauly," said Amanda in her subtle North Carolina drawl, "and I've been reading your blogs everyday."

Amanda first cut her teeth in tournament reporting at the LA Poker Classic two months ago. In a short time, she became a veteran and told me how much fun she was having getting to travel all over America and staying in nice hotels and being around poker. She reminded me how cool it was that we got to do what we do. I'm sure it was her fresh perspective on things since she's still new to the business, but like my conversation with Steve Rosenbloom, a few things Amanda said struck a nerve. She was right. We had a cool job, despite all the bullshit we had to put up with.

The Poker Wire girls told me that I needed to come back to the circuit. It made me feel a little guilty about taking time away and I also felt humbled that I was sincerely missed over the last few events. One of the hardest parts of cutting back my schedule was not being able to hang out and see some friends that I made in the trenches over the past year. I cannot tell you how many late nights I bonded with the Poker Wire girls and BJ at 3am, as we sat glued to the laptops with our eyes on the tables waiting and praying for something to happen. Although we all had different personalities, we all got along and respected each other's work and individual talents. That's rare these days.

I had dinner plans with my buddy Friedman in Summerlin and left the Bellagio early. Again I felt guilty that everyone was hard at work while I took a lax approach to the event and drank on the job and bullshitted with Gavin Smith and William Rockwell while worker bees ran out onto the floor to get obsolete chip counts. I became the guy that I fuckin' hated during my previous tournaments, the one who did not work and had all the fun. I reminded myself that I was there to enjoy myself first and work was secondary. Shit, I was at the largest WPT event of all time and I wanted to live in the moment and survey the carnival like atmosphere. It reminded me of that night I slipped two hits of liquid sunshine under my tongue and watched one of my fraternity brother's hamster eat three of it's babies as we listened to Pink Floyd's Dark Side of the Moon.

As I walked out of the room and walked past the hordes of fans and tourists held back by the surly security guards in maroon jackets, a warm feeling settled in my stomach. For the first time in months I noticed the little things that made this job simply amazing and fun.

Life is about small simple pleasures.

I forgot about that and allowed negative thoughts to clutter my mind for months and I finally got to focus on what's amazing about doing what I do. It's the little things like drinking with Spaceman on a break at the hooker bar or dishing dirt and gossip with Joy. Or hanging out with the Poker Wire girls. Or getting a smile from Liz Lieu when I waved at her. Or talking playoff hockey with a real sportswriter like Rosenbloom. Or staring at the fake boobs the size of Volvos on some of the models that random poker rooms hire to pimp their product.

I had a great dinner and a few hours of conversation with Friedman during my post-Bellagio trip to Summerlin. We went to some Nevada themed tavern and he told me that I seemed happier and in a good head space. I was for the first time in a while. I finally got to watch the Sopranos and it was one of the better episodes of the year. As I drove home from Summerlin to Henderson from one edge of the Las Vegas suburbs to the other, I drove past the exit on I-15 where the Redneck Riviera was located and pulled off the highway. The blinking In-n-Out Burger sign made my mouth salivate like Pavlov's frothing dog. I stopped for a chocolate shake to enjoy for the rest of the drive back as I listened to the Beatles' Abbey Road.

That was the same In-n-Out Burger where I ate at twice a week when I lived a few blocks away during the 2005 WSOP. I was tempted to drive through and check up on my old stomping grounds at the Redneck Riviera, but I wisely decided against it. I didn't want to get carjacked by a shirtless tweaker with a tear-drop tattoo who had been up for two weeks straight or get caught up in a drug sweep during a meth lab bust from Las Vegas's SWAT and anti-narcotics team.

I drove back to Henderson as Polythene Pam blasted on the CD player. With the windows down, the cool Nevada air swirled around my rental car. I sipped on my thick shake and thought about what I was gonna write for the Tao of Poker, LasVegasVegas, and for Poker Player Newspaper as I glanced at the glimmering lights of the Strip fading away in the rearview mirror.

Wednesday Pimp Day: Placentas, the WPT Championship, and Shilling

So much has happened since I went on hiatus. Like Katie Holmes had a baby and Tom Cruise ate the placenta. Holy fucknuts, Dawson! If you think online poker is rigged... that entire relationship is freakin' rigged. Did anyone else think that the pregnancy was a fake or was it just me?

Anyway, here's some quick shoutouts to worthy bloggers...

There are two bloggers who won seats to the WSOP after they won the last WSOP WPBT event on Poker Stars. Congrats to Lucko at Poker Cash and Wes at Hunts Vegas Poker. And thanks to Iggy for setting it up and donating his own money to make sure that two seats were awarded.

One of my favorite bloggers, ScurvyDog from Sound of a Suckout won a bracelet race on Full Tilt. Sweet!

The Donkey Hunter won a seat in the main event this weekend too. Good job, bro.

The lovely Jaxia was crowned Miss Texas after she won a FPP Heads-up tourney on Poker Stars for the World Cup of Poker. I got to see her crack aces with 7-4 after she flopped trips. Good girl! She got to represnt the nation of Texas in Team Texas and went 1-1 in her matches.

The Poker Nerd is approaching SuperNova status. I think he'll be the first (and only) blogger to get there.

Stop by April's blog for info on the next blogger event and tournament in Las Vegas, scheduled for July 8th. Click here for info on a group hotel rate at the Castle. I'll be there along with Derek and I'm taking off three days from covering the 2006 WSOP so I can hang out and get shitfaced with all my degenerate friends. If you're lucky, you'll get to play craps at Casino Royale with CJ and me! Here's a list of bloggers who are coming in July.

And then there's Poker Champ. I want to do an interview with him to post here and hopefully he'll accept.

In poker news, WSOP Champion Puggy Pearson passed away last week. I met him during the 2005 WSOP and he was cracking me up. I heard rumors that he was a racist, chauvanist, and a cheater but what I saw was a frail old man with a big smile who lived life and had several great stories. And congrats to Flipchip, who got his Puggy Pearson article mentioned on Fark!

And then there's the online poker legality debate. I should sound off on it, but I'll save that for another post. Lou Kreiger had some thoughts on the matter that you should read.

If you don't know, I won a prop bet against Change100 last weekend. I fear vegetables and she offered me a prop bet. Here's a bit...

Pauly hates vegetables. He hates them in a way that I have never seen a human being hate vegetables before. If any portion of any item in his order contains vegetables, they are picked off. Lettuce and tomato on a burger? Not for Pauly. Bok choy and bamboo shoots in the Chinese food? They'll be removed before he takes a single bite. I've seen him take onions and tomatoes out of pasta because the pieces are too big.

By the end of his first visit to Los Angeles, I hadn't seen a single vegetable pass his lips and proposed a serious prop bet. For $4000, Pauly would have to eat nothing but vegetables for a period of seven days. Potatoes do not count. Tomatoes do not count-- they are a fruit. So are avocados. Dressings would be strictly portioned and rationed. And only water-- no iced tea. Veggies only. I didn't think he'd last beyond 24 hours... More

In personal news, I got a promotion at Poker Player Newspaper. Stan, the editor, gave me my own column with the topic being online poker. Poker Player Newspaper is bi-monthly and my column should be in every issue starting sometime next month. I will also continue to write features for them and contribute to the online site. I've been writing for Poker Player Newspaper for over a year and I'm pumped that I finally got the column. This will be one of the few freelance gigs that I'm keeping. Thanks to Stan and to the Poker Prof who originally recommended me for the job.

Moving on...

I have to do some shilling right now. So suck it up. Consider this a "word from our sponsors." Afterall, someone has to cover my poker and stock market loses... although after I complained about getting kicked in the junk by Brasil Telecom, it's up over $1 since Monday. It's up today and was up $0.81 cents yesterday.

Poker Stars is running WSOP satellites right now. Two of the last three WSOP champions won their main event seats online at Poker Stars. So what are you waiting for?

Party Poker has been offering up random bonuses. You have to log in to see if you are eligible. I got a $100 reload bonus coming my way. Weeeeee.

Full Tilt also has a reload bonus. This one is 50% reload bonus up to $300. You have until April 30th to reload.

I got a couple of bonuses to work off over the next week or so. I had been focusing on grinding away at the tables on Party Poker to re-build the bankroll and clear the bonus. Party still harbors some of the fishiest players around. I've been slumming at 3/6 playing 3 tables at once or playing one or two 5/10 tables, both full ring and 6-max. Beware of the 5/10 short-handed tables... the swings are brutal. Alas, I love the action. I've been dabbling at the 10/20 tables and the players there are just as atrocious as the level of play on the 2/4 tables. Yesterday, I was down 1BB at 10/20 but had a nice hit-and-run session at the 5/10 tables. I also like playing on Party because I don't play under "DrPauly" and have an anonymous screen name.

Seriously, the cash games on Party Poker are the softest around and have been so for the past few years. I'll be honest with you... I play tournaments on other sites, but I pad my bankroll with the constant poor decision making of the players on Party Poker. I'm hoping I can fleece enough fish, donkeys, emus, koala bears, kangaroos, and tourists so I can pay for my trip to Thailand at the end of the year. When I'm sipping Singha's in a bar on Samui island brushing off the advances of thirty nubile and scantily clad Thai hookers, I'll be thanking all the fish out there who chased their fourth nut draws.

Speaking of Thai hookers...

I played in the WWdN tournament on Poker Stars last night and ran into pocket aces with my 10-10. The tournament was called the Change100 Invitational. Everyone's favorite Hollyweird junkgrabber busted Wil last week. Congrats to Maudie, who won it all! Way to go, sweet sweet Maudie.

Oh, slighty off the topic... I'm pretty excited. I finally decided to buy MLB.tv so I can watch Yankees games from my laptop. I purchased the package specifically for the 2006 WSOP and the times that I crash at my mother's apartment in NYC since she doesn't get the YES network. It's $80 and worth it because I can watch any other games (that aren't blacked out). I toggled between the Yankees-BlueJays game and the Mets-Bravos game last night. And yes, the Yankees sucked ostrich testicles. I watched a rare weekday day game right now (watching baseball at 10am on the West Coast is kinda weird for me) and the Bronx Bombers bounced back. They were up 3-1 in the ninth inning when Mo Riveria took the mound to seal the victory with his second save of the season.

I gotta go now because I'm heading to the Bellagio to play $8/$16 against sauced up tourists. I'm also going to watch some of the World Poker Tour Championship that started yesterday at the Bellagio. I'll be posting end of day recaps over at Las Vegas and Poker blog. I'm going to be taking some photos today and will eventually post them here. I will not be live blogging anything on the Tao of Poker... until the final table next Monday. But I'll be at the Bellagio everyday between now and Monday so stop by the poker room or Fontana Room and say hello!

April Sojourn

One of the first paid writing gigs came my way almost ten years ago when I lived on the fringe of society in Seattle. A ragtag music zine in Austin, Texas offered me $100 to write reviews of 5 CDs from random indie rock bands that you never heard of. That broke down to $20 per album review. The catch was that I had to buy the CDs myself so I only ended up making about $5 per review. But back then, I lived paycheck to paycheck so getting $25 for something I wrote was as epic as winning an Oscar for Best Original Screenplay. I wrote because that's what I loved to do and getting paid to write about music was a bonus. I did that four or five times before the magazine folded when the owner went to jail for tax evasion. Although his last check bounced, I'm lucky that the other checks actually cleared. And if I ever run across that fucktard again, I'm gonna demand my $100 plus interest. It's never been about the money. It's all about principle.

It was almost 10pm last Thursday night as I walked past Union Square in downtown San Francisco. I spotted a Borders bookstore and went inside looking for a map. I planned on driving down Pacific Coast Highway back to Los Angeles and I wanted to verify the route. I've done it several times before, but I didn't have any atlases or maps with me this time. Plus, I like plotting out my trips on paper before I take them. As I searched each floor of the multifloor bookstore, I discovered the magazine section. I wandered by and found the poker section which was comprised of three magazines; All In, Bluff, and Poker Pro.

I grabbed Bluff. A few months ago, Amy Calistri told the editor that I'd be perfect for a specific assignment on poker blogs. I was supposed to have an article appear in the May issue but to my disappointment it had not been released yet. The editor of Bluff told me that the poker blogs article was bumped from the April issue to the May issue because Michael Craig wrote a piece about the heads-up matches between Andy Beal and the Corporation. That was added at the last minute. The editor wrote me to apologize and explain why I'd have to wait another month to see my piece. I told him that I understood completely. If I'm gonna get bumped by another writer, I was honored that it was author Michael Craig. He's a real writer, not like majority of the hacks that populate the poker publishing industry. I'm a fan of Craig's work and let's be honest, reading about Andy Beal and the Corporation is gonna sell more magazines that my piece about poker blogs. Keep your eyes out for the May issue. I mentioned a slew of poker blogs by name and I hope that the copy editor didn't cut down my piece for space.

I thumbed through the latest issue of Poker Pro magazine, the one with David Williams on the cover. Lou Krieger recommended me to the editors/owners last year. Lou's a big fan of my writing and admires my work ethic. I'm seriously thankful that I came across stand-up people like Amy and Lou in this brutal industry. He helped secure me a monthly tournament column. If you pick up a copy of any Poker Pro, you'll find some of my tournament coverage in there. The current issue has a piece on the Borgata Winter Open and features several of my photographs.

I went 1 for 2 at the Borders searching for my articles in major poker magazines. I eventually found the map of PCH that I was looking for and planned out my drive back to Hollyweird. I never went into Borders to look for any poker magazines. I was on vacation from all things poker. But when I spotted the magazine rack, I instantly recalled the Bluff article that I wrote and I wanted to see it in print. On a random sidenote, I haven't been paid for that article yet. Magazines wait until the issue hits the stands before they pay the writers so usually it's a six month gap from the day I get the assignment to the day I actually get the check.

As I walked out of Borders and back onto Powell Street, a one-legged panhandler sat in a wheelchair on the corner adjacent from Union Square. He held up a piece of paper. On one side it read, "Hi!" and on the other it said "Smile!"

Life can be a coinflip sometimes. I managed to get extremely lucky in life. One bad decision or a streak of misfortune and I could have been the homeless guy in the wheelchair. That eternal philosophical question popped up... "Why am I me instead of that guy?"

As I stood waiting for the light to change, the brisk evening San Francisco air made me shiver as a wave of humility fell over me. My life has been so hectic over the past year and a half that I've had very little time to enjoy the success I've had as a writer. In a blink, all of this can be all gone. I guess you can say that I stopped to smell the roses. Sometimes I focus too much on the past or the future that I forget to focus on the present.

I've been enjoying the "now" and been taking the last two weeks to fully soak up my accomplishments and trying to figure out the next step on my journey. One of the things I had to figure out is why am I writing and what I hope to accomplish in the future, as well as list four or five projects that I'd like to pursue. Part of my time in Hollyweird was trying to find a literary agent to help find me work and more importantly negotiate what I'm worth. For the past year I've been underpaid for everything I've written. Part of that was because I was a rookie and I didn't have a choice since I was unpublished and unknown. I also made several mistakes and got screwed over by people I thought I could trust and allowed myself and my writing to get exploited. Luckily I met people like the Poker Prof, Flipchip, and Lou. They all helped steer me in the right direction.

In my second year in his industry, I'm a little more wiser and I've taken Wil's advice and started declining work. I had over-extended myself and committed to too many things. Writing and working in the poker industry burnt me out. I tried my best to construct a lifestyle with a better balance of poker and non-poker things this year. It didn't work out and I had to step back and try again.

I've achieved several personal goals as a writer over the past few years. They were small goals like starting my own blogzine Truckin', completing a screenplay for Project Greenlight, finishing my first novel Jack Tripper Stole My Dog, completing NaNoWriMo (more than once), and getting published in a magazine. My next two goals are to sell a screenplay in Hollyweird and have one of my novels published.

Having a popular poker blog was never on my "To Do List." What's happened here has been a happy accident. Remember, I started this blog out of a mutiny from my friends who got sick of reading my poker exploits on the Tao of Pauly. To this day, I kick myself int he balls because I made a huge mistake. If I never started Tao of Poker, then my main blog would be the popular site and I'd only have to worry about keeping up one Tao a day instead of two.

But that was not the path I took. I split the Taos and the Tao of Poker has gotten me on the front page of Fox Sports and the cover story of Poker Player Newspaper. Twice. Inside of four weeks this year, I shook hands with Miss America and George Costanza from Seinfeld (played by actor Jason Alexander)... and both were in a poker room. I've also had hour long conversations with the CEO of a major casino and with the manager of one of the largest online poker rooms. Both were interested in hiring me for huge projects that would have paid me the equivalent of a NYC teacher's yearly salary for about two or three months of work. And you know what? I turned them both down.

Last month I turned down a free cruise to the Bahamas to cover a poker tournament. A few weeks ago, I almost turned down an invite to the Playboy Mansion. Wait, I did turn it down at first and changed my mind after I came to my senses.

Regardless, there's a pattern developing here. I wanted to discover the source of all this negativity that developed with me and poker. It turned into a bad marriage and didn't happen overnight. Over the past year I lost a passion for poker and that affected my writing, my blogs, my relationships, and most importantly... my bankroll. I guess I could blame poker as a whole, but that's not entirely accurate. I shoulder a large percentage of the blame if not most of it. I allowed all of this to happen and I'm glad I stopped to figure out what was going on before it got really ugly.

I love poker but it's not a "love" that lasts a 24 hour a day, seven days a week, 365 days a year kind of thing. I had to figure out what aspects of poker that I love the most and start from there.

I always had a desire to seek out a well-balanced and well-rounded life. And that's why I hit the wall with poker. My life over the past year has been consumed with poker. I can't think of a time where one thing has taken over all aspects of my life. I wrote in a post on the Tao of Pauly that poker was suffocating me as a person and as a writer. Unless I make time for other aspects of life, I'm never going to survive. I'm passionate about so many other things in life such as food, travel, women, live music, sports, and writing. I wish I had more time to experience my other passions.

I've cut back on the tournaments that I cover, skipping three WPT events; Reno, Foxwoods, and Bay 101. I've cut back several of my freelance gigs. I finally have breathing room for the first time in over a year. Yeah, too much of one thing is never good. I'm hoping that reducing the role of poker in my life by 27% (I totally made up that number) will allow me to rediscover the passion of poker, and most importantly the passion for writing again.

I've already burnt out as a tournament reporter and any of my close friends know about the "incidents" during the 2005 WSOP when I suffered a mental breakdown. On three separate instances I was ready to quit or was threatened to be fired. Working at the Rio for six straight weeks last summer really fucked me up. I guess you can say I burnt out before the main event even started.

This year, I'll be better prepared for the WSOP. I'm gonna be taking more breaks and will be resting more during the first four weeks instead of keeping up the frenetic pace that I endured last year. I had two instances were I slept less than 10 hours in a single week. Shit, I know people who sleep 10 hours a day and I got 10 hours of slumber during the entire main event last year.

Do you ever hear a song for the first time that you fall in love with right away? You buy the CD and you listen to it a million times. At some point, you stop listening to it. Heck, you might hear it out in a bar or even worse, it's been turned into elevator music or appears on a car commercial. You get to a boiling point and even say, "If I fuckin hear that song one more time I'm gonna explode!!"

That's how I felt about poker for the last couple of months. The major contributing factor is the depravity of the poker industry. That gets glossed over my the Travel Channel, ESPN, and all the poker publications. I really want to be honest about what I have seen in the poker industry. I can't and it's frustrating. It's hard to censor myself and keep quiet, yet I'm doing just that and it made me miserable. I've always been one to speak my mind, but in doing so, I would end up hurting friends, several pros, and would kill whatever writing career I have.

Gambling is a desperate act. Sure, I get off on it. We all do. But the reasons why we gamble are deeply rooted in self-esteem issues and obsessive compulsive behavior. I'm a known addict and action junkie. Poker is perfect for my degenerate personality because it has some intellectual aspects as much as "The Rush." Whose heart doesn't race when they are waiting for that river card to be dealt to seal our fate or save our ass? For some you lost in your life, the rush of poker is a real feeling. It makes you feel alive in the moment and that's why you do it.

Humans have always sought to get high in one form or another. For some people it's Christ. For others its cocaine. For anyone reading this post... it's poker.

I'm stuck $10K since Halloween and feel like a total loser. My losses spanned several months and included poker, sports betting, and the stock market. I got my ass handed to me during the March Madness tournament. I also have been taking a bath in a few stocks, in particular Brazil Telecom. I've been making plenty of poor decisions over the last few months and I think that the pressure of being in poker has affected me. I needed to step back an analyze why everything went wrong.

I didn't prep for this year's March Madness like I've done in the past watching hundreds of hours of games leading up to the tournament and crunching the numbers like defensive FG% and second-half FT%. I didn't have the time to fully analyze my stock picks and that hurt my retirement fund. I made money when I worked on Wall Street not because I could pick winners. I made money because I was a scumbag and churned your accounts.

Greg Raymer told me that "successful tournament players are able to make good decisions."

I've always reminded myself those words before I play in any poker tournament. I wish I did that before I bought that dogshit stock and made about ten or eleven horrible picks in the March Madness games.

I guess you can say that I got benched. The coach in me pulled me from the game and told me to sit down and think about my mistakes. I've spent many hours thinking and reflecting about the poor decisions and all the "inaction" that took place over the last year. Inaction is worse than a bad decision since it's not making a decision at all.

I feel a lot better knowing that I've been taking time out to reassess a lot of things in my life, especially with how poker relates to me. The "tao" represents "the way." I got lost and I'm finding my way back to the Tao.

It's hard for me to walk away from poker because I love playing it too much. Just the other night, I won a big pot playing $5/$10 on Party Poker. Nothing too special except that I had A-K and rivered two pair but the river card made a flush. I expected to lose the pot and made a crying call on the river only to see the pot shipped my way.

I had not been that excited about a hand in months and I screamed, "Thanks for calling with top pair dipshit!"

I guess it had been a while since I won something. I felt "the rush" playing poker for the first time in a very long time.

Final Table and Hammering Out Cancer


Click to enlarge
I'm back in Las Vegas and my JetBlue flight from Long Beach, CA was early so I was able to play in the Hammer Out Cancer WPBT-POY charity tournament on Full Tilt where $15 per entry was being donated to the American Cancer Society. I ended up coming in 2nd place out of 61.

I didn't play perfect poker, instead I got lucky and the right things happened for me. I got cards when I was shortstacked. My good hands held up against weaker ones. I won a timely coinflip against the chipleader. My pocket Aces and Kings held up everytime. I folded J-J twice to huge re-raises preflop; once to SoxLover's Hiltons and the other time to SirWaffle's K-K. And I had one big suckout when I was dominated.

My starting table included IPlayLikePhil, SoxLover, Change100, LA Loan Shark, WooWoo3, Drizz, Gracie, and Rod. In the first hour, I flopped a set with A-A against BG. By the end of the first break I was 10th in chips with 37 players remaining.

By the second break, I was in 8th place out of 14. I doubled up after I sucked out on SoxLover. My K-Q bested his A-Q when I hit a three-outer. Derek made a huge run over at his table. At one point he was in 36th place with 36 players left and had a paltry 105 chips in his shortest of stacks. He went on a tear and ended up 6th in chips by the second break.

I made the final table and I'm proud to say that I also made the final table with my brother. That's never happened before in any MTT that we've played in. The Rooster predicted that it was going to happen.

***** Final Table Live Blogging Updates *****

11:31pm... Derek bounced out in 9th place when his Hammer lost in a 3 way pot. He outflopped A-K and K-Qs but his hand could not hold up.

11:40pm... I won a race with A-K against BG's 7-7. I raised preflop, he reraised and I moved all in. I turned a King and doubled up. I'm currently the chipleader with 29K and 6 players remaining.

11:50pm... Down to 4 players. I'm 2nd in chips.

11:52pm... With A-A holding up, I busted bsabala1's A-5. He took 3rd place.

11:53pm... I found myself heads up with FrankL and behind 62K to 26K in chips. Frankl had a 2.5 to 1 margin on me. I won the first hand but lost the second hand and got sent to the rail. Yeah, our battle lasted only two hands. I busted in second place (out of 61 players) when I moved all in on a flush draw. Frankl had top pair and won it all. Congrats!!

1:55am... According to the WPBT-POY rankings, I jumped up to 8th place. I was languishing in like 55th place or something awful like that. Derek is currently 12th on the leaderboard. StB is still the points leader... by a lot. I had gotten A-A and K-K brutally cracked in previous WPBT-POY events so it felt good to make the final table, make the money, and finish in second place which improved my POY ranking. The Top 5 bloggers on the leaderboard include: StB, lucko21, Gracie, Bad Blood, and DoubleDave.

Thanks again to Easycure for setting this event up and to Byron for keeping the POY points. And thanks to everyone who participated. I think that Easycure raised at least $1000. It was really cool getting to play at the same table as my friend Shirley a.k.a. Poker Babe, who if you didn't know, was diagnosed with breast cancer a few months ago.

Hammer Out Cancer

I signed up for EasyCure's charity tournament and will be playing this Sunday. How about you?

Hammer Out Cancer... a WPBT-POY Circuit Event
Organized by EasyCure

What: NL charity tourney (Tournament ID 3381723 under the Private section)
When: Sunday, April 16th
Time: 9pm EST or 6pm PCT
Where: Full Tilt Poker
Cost: $10 + $16 ($15 goes to American Cancer Society)
Password: dahammer

Excuse Me for a Moment...

Did you ever have that overwhelming feeling where you need to take a step outside and catch a breath of fresh air? Perhaps you went to your favorite bar on a Friday night or you are at a friend's party. You are one of the first to arrive and you get to witness the entire party/bar/scene take form as the first guests show up and the place slowly fills up. You get engrossed in lively conversation with different friends, some of which you haven't seen or talked to in a while. In fact everyone is coming over to talk to you and get you a drink. Then at one magical moment, you look around and realize that some of your favorite people in the world are in the same room as you. Not only are you having an amazing time, but you're sharing it with some of the most special people in your life. That collective original experience is one that warm memories are made of. It's something you'll look back on years from now and smile.

Then there's that one defining moment which happens at every party and every night in a bar. I guess Malcolm Gladwell would describe that moment as the "tipping point" where everything changes. There's always one part of the night where all the fun, energy, and excitement peaks, and the events from the remainder of the night slowly creep away, not quite matching up to the apex of the party. You then find yourself in a crowded room, but only recognize a few faces.

That's where I'm at right now.

The party is raging and I'm overwhelmed. Maybe I had too much to drink, or mabye it got so crowded that I could barely move or breathe. Regardless, I desperately needed to leave the party for a few minutes to get my space together. I want to go back inside and enjoy the rest of the night. And I will. However, for right now I need to walk around the block before I finish up the night strongly with my friends.

I'm embarking on the "beginning of the end." Not to worry, we can still have a good time together. There's still a few more hours left before the cops bust up the party or before the bartender flickers the lights and announces, "Last call!"

So please excuse me for a little while longer. I'll be back soon...

Oh, and this blurb called "Pauly pauses for a breath" made me chuckle. It's from the UK Times. Thanks for the warm sentiments from across the pond, Howard.