Good Start in Atlantic City!!!

Great flight! I am becoming a huge fan of Air Tran...with exit rows like business class, and a $40 upgrade to 1st class from Atlanta to A.C. I couldn't have asked for a better way to start the trip!

Got checked into my room...and in front of my elevator stood Jason Young! tada....and since I have been carrying a little personal debt with Jason around (and not liking it!) for a while, the first thing I did was settle up with him. Even tried to give him interest, but he just wasn't having any of that. What a guy! He called it an early night....but I was itching to see if I could maybe satellite my way into today's $1650 event.

Got to the poker room, and BOOM! There was one seat left on the last $540 of the night. Now, I typically do NOT like to start my trips by playing in $540 SNG's...but two things were at work here. (a) I'm running good and (b) it was the last one of the night. Oh...and (c) the structure on their SNG's is ridiculously great! Plus they pay out 3 spots.

We got a $200 last longer going with 7 players...so there was another $1400 on the side. About halfway through it, they were awarding the winner for the $2000 Heads Up tourney...and low and behold, it was ANOTHER friend of mine...Jeremy "Ears" McLaughlin...one of the absolute nicest guys in the game. I'm telling you...what a year for all these players I'm chummy with this year! This is definitely going to go down as a memorable year for a LOT of guys...AND gals!

There was some very, very aggressive play taking place in this SNG...with people wanting to get their whole stacks in when it didnt really warrant that. I hope I see a lot of that today! I just kind of sat around and let the action come to me. Make a long story short here. We got down to 3 and me and the other guy left in the last longer both took $700. FREEROLL! Then him and I got heads up...and even though I had a sizeable chip advantage...it was now well after 3am...yeah, a 3 hour sit n go...and I wanted to get some sleep, so I was okay with taking a chop for $2250 each...with the $700....hey $2950 was a good way to start the trip.

Feeling pretty good on Day 1 at Borgata...and very excited for today's $1650. Saw a lot of my Northeastern buddies last night...and its amazing how word travels around the poker community when you make a good score. It felt really good to get congratulated by guys who I KNOW genuinely felt happy for me. That is one of the most rewarding elements to this game...the 'real' players out there. Hell, even Gavin Smith shouted across the room to me about it. We then walked out together, after he had min-cashed the nightly and was grumbling about it.

Well, alright...lets get after it!!!

Monkey