"Ahhhh what the Hell, I'm tired...."

If you are a poker player...either professional or part-time, you have at one time or another heard this line. And everytime you hear it...doesn't it usually almost always precede your demise?

Ohhhh...I know you have me beat, Sonny Boy...but hell, I really don't care about this tourney, and I'm so tired, my Geritol is wearing off, and I need to get home to see the late edition of Cagney & Lacey on Lifetime....what the hell, I call!

Things are going perfectly fine. Your stack is right where it needs to be to have a chance. 'That Guy' who likes to limp every hand...no-no...I mean, EVERY HAND...has once again limped in...when you look down at that pesky AK. Suited, even. So you raise, in this case...from 200/400 to 1600.

Folds to the guy in the SB...the one who has been whining about his brief outing at the Rio in the WSOP earlier...who is sporting a horrible sun burn, to compliment his bad haircut, all while rubbing his head in an act of self pity. He squirms around in his chair...and finally decides to call the 1600...leaving behind 3400...another awesome decision by the not-so-talented poker amateur from God-knows-where. Leg Humper McGee also decides his hand is worth another 1200.

You thank the Poker Gods when the flop comes A-2-4. They both check...and you are certain you have just won yourself a nice 5k pot. You bet 3k. Then you hear the sound of the scratching record...made when a white guy walks into a party at an all-black fraternity house...

And you hear that line:  "Ahhhh what the hell, I'm tired...I'll gamble with you." Huh? Yeah...tired old redneck has moved all in...and the first thing you wonder is how bad his kicker is, and will he hit it? Humpy the Leg Humper folds...you call, and are waiting to see his Ax when he turns over 5-5. Oh. Fives? Called with a gutshot? Well, okay...I guess we like that call? Or do we? A five hits the river...and the speech from 'The Tired Guy' begins. You just bury your head in your hands...bite your tongue, and wait for the next song to start on your iPod. You have been had by THE OLD TIRED GUY!

Couple of things. In Vegas...content just piles up. Fast. I have no shortage of things to blog about. What I do have a shortage of...is time. And I know most of you are NOT capable of sitting down and reading for more than 4-7 minutes...so a real battle rages in my writing decisions on how much needs to be edited out. In a slow month...while playing somewhere like Tunica...it is a struggle to come up with shit to write about. But in Vegas? Are you kidding me? I have taken to using the 'Voice Memo' app on my iPhone to start recording things so I don't forget them. So much funny shit happens (at least in my opinion) that I find myself not even talking about poker very much.

Lets get into somethings:

Taxi! Dammit! Taxi!!!! WTF!??? Look at MEEEEE...I'm super hot! Why won't any of you stop!!??? Are you gay or what? Son of a ......

While in Vegas...you will see lots of women. Around 2-4am every day you will see them roaming around the streets of the city, a high percentage of them carrying their high heels in hand...and becoming a member of what I like to call "The Black Footers" gang...girls walking barefoot thru the streets of Vegas when their feet can take no more of the pain the shoes have afforded them, all in the interest of looking sexy. The smart/classy ones anticipate this and carry with them...a small, thin pair of flip flops. These are the ones you bring home to the parents.

Well, my favorite is when I see a gaggle of girls standing on the corner trying to hail a taxi cab. We all know where these ladies are from, right? Yep...these are East Coast broads. New York, New Jersey, maybe Boston. Where the way to get a cab is stand in the street and yell or whistle as loud as you can while holding you arm in the air. Not in Vegas ladies...nope! Cabs here are required to pick up passengers at designated places...like the front of hotels. Those girls will just stand there for God knows how long...and its just funny. Very funny.

See that chip stack? Limit player. You see this all the time...but only with limit players? Why? Why do they do this? Occasionally, you will get a player in a NL tourney who will stack his chips like that...and you know immediately that this is a predominantly limit player. I wish I knew why they do this. It baffles me. While driving me crazy at the same time...especially if I am seated next to them. Yikes.

See this car? Yes...it is a piece of shit. Sitting outside of Caeser's Palace, in the Valet waiting area...I was surrounded by a plethora of horribly dressed Mexican girls, from somewhere in Southern California...and their pimped up boyfriends. I counted 11 of them. Then this sound emerges...what is that? What the hell...I am looking around...and there it is. THE BEAST! Mis-matched quarter panels, fender hanging from the front of the thing...puttering, sputtering...I see the valet guy climb out of it, and the look on his face is priceless. Something like "OMG...get me outa this thing!!!"

First of all, why would ANYONE park this piece of crap in valet in the first place? I think there should be some qualifying parameters to parking in valet. One of them should be that you can guarantee the parking attendants that the car will make it to their lot and back to the pick up site without breaking down. Well, this one barely made it. And I sat in amazement...and SHOCK...as I watched all 11 of them pile into this hunk of crap. ELEVEN! And off they went. Well, at least their being energy conscious, right? Carpooling is alive and well on Friday night in Vegas!!!

Hi! I'm Kai Landry's hot iron...or hair press...or whatever you want to call me. I hide under the bathroom sink where Monkey can't find me...

Yeah...I made the discovery this week while Kai was off dilly-dallying in Biloxi with his new car and new poker table. Now we know the secret of Kai's scarecrow-looking hair do. I didn't think there was any way that hair of his could be natural. And of course...it isn't. Like a little bitch, he's in there spending way-too-much time making that shit do things that no man with a penis over three inches should EVER be even thinking about performing. I'm guessing his little girls aren't aware of this deep dark secret. I'm not telling them.

OMG OMG OMG!!! Are you Durrrr??? I'm like, you're biggest fan...can I please get your autograph? And maybe a picture with you????

Yeah, that's him. The subject of my ire. The one who has trained all these fucktards how to slow the game down to a mind-numbing pace. Who has made staring like a deer in the headlights all the rage. During a break in the 1500 he happened by...and before I could open-field tackle him and curse him for causing me to miss at least an extra 5 or 6 hands of EVERY level of EVERY tournament this summer...he was intercepted by this dork wanting to initiate his 'brush with greatness.' You see this a lot in Vegas during WSOP. Poker dorks who idolize those who have had a modicum of success in poker. I don't get it. I just don't get it. It's not that I necessarily want to punch these guys in the face...I just feel sorry for them, for being such losers that they think a brief, meaningless conversation, or a photo op, with a successful poker player somehow enriches their life. Ugh.

Who is that hooded villian? Is it Dwyte 'The Duke' Pilgrim? Or could it just be Senor Monkey striking a villianous pose? Go with Option B.

Poker has been kicking my ass a little less that past week. I've managed to snap off a couple of more decent sized SNG's at Rio. I've had a couple of min cashes. Yesterday at The Nugget, I took 3rd in the $550 limit Omaha, for $2100...I'd like to give details, but I'm now short on time, and Kai and I are going to go play the $340 at Caeser's today. I think tomorrow it will be the $1k Main Event at Nugget...Saturday I think its the $1k at Rio...unless I'm at the Final Table of Nugget, in which case I will play the Rio $1k on Sunday instead. Then the big $1k satellites start for the WSOP Main Event...which I absolutely, positively MUST be a part of this year. I had a couple of deep, deep runs in the $235 2pm Deepstacks at Rio...one that ended with me going out 118th (paying 117) when I got AQ in against AK and lost while enjoying a day where I was chipleader at my table for about 10 levels. That was awesome. A couple days later I went out 30 from the money.

This has been a summer full of close calls and disappointing river beats. Hypothetically, I could very easily be up about $80 to $100k right now...but as it is I am instead down about $10-$12k. I would call that horrible...except that I hear all these guys brooding about being down $30 or $40k and I find myself feeling pretty good. I mean..these are what most consider to be  'excellent' players...so maybe I'm not doing all that bad. Whats freaking me out...is that all of my winnings in SNG's and Tourneys total about $17,000...and I'm down that much? Yeah...rough business this poker! But as we all know...it only takes on decent score to make all that pain go away. 

Okay...I've gotta split. I will try not to wait another week before I blog again!!!!

MONKEY