Black Old Man Shoes

Good morning everyone.  Two posts in two weeks - I have to pace myself...  I feel refreshed as I begin this post, as I find myself in the middle of having three straight days off.  I love my job as a ticket writer, and would prefer working and having the $$$ that goes along with it, but if you're going to force me to sleep...  :)  Considering how much poker I've played and football betting that I did this past fall, I've actually been pretty disciplined with my money since starting my job at the end of August, and now I feel comfortable enough with my finances to take some shots at no limit poker cash games here in the near future.  One of the reasons that I started this blog back in the day was to track my weekly football predictions with the intent of possibly moving back to Las Vegas someday.  For those of you who don't know, I first lived here from May 2005 to April 2007, and I worked as a poker dealer during the majority of that stint.  It's safe to say that I now know a lot more about sports betting than I ever have (and I wasn't exactly starting from a position of complete ignorance before), and my poker knowledge continues to grow with each passing day.  A funny revelation about working in the sportsbooks is that A LOT of my coworkers share my passion for poker and/or sports betting.  My brother Pete, David, Ben, Errol, Mike, Mike, Chris, Don, Kirk, and Adam are among the ticket writers I work with who enjoy playing a little poker.  Back to Errol, he actually shared something with me on Facebook recently, and it turns out that it would be the ultimate Las Vegas apartment complex for me to move into...

In reality, I will be looking to improve my living situation in the near future.  I'm not in the worst place on the planet, but if I can find something closer to work, or cheaper, or nicer, or a combination of the three, etc..., it might be worth moving.  As things stand, I am about to take more shots at no limit poker, and to start studying more (again).  When I was in New Hampshire last February, I started a one-year subscription to Card Player magazine.  I did so thinking that I would be living there until December, and as luck would have it, I moved out here in May.  Now in the past, if I had an active subscription to any magazine, it would never find my new address.  However, now that I'm living in the desert, where you can pick up free magazines in several poker rooms, the Card Players naturally found me, and I have a STACK of reading to catch up on.

Poker and work, work and poker...  We've been a little slow at work since the Super Bowl, but things are about to pick up in the month of March.  The Las Vegas Speedway will be hosting NASCAR from the 10th-12th, and the NCAA Men's Basketball Tournament will be kicking into full gear on the 16th, the following Thursday.  The first four days of this tournament combined typically see as much money wagered as the Super Bowl.  Following the madness, we'll have the stretch runs of the NBA and NHL, with baseball and the Kentucky Derby in the mix.  Once we reach June and things have slowed to a crawl, luckily for me, the World Series of Poker will be underway.  I plan on spending a lot of time at the Rio this summer.  Even when I'm not playing, I can spend hours and hours just watching the live cash games and tournaments, trying to pick things up.  This year's World Series of Poker is scheduled to run from May 30th - July 17th for those of you who are keeping score at home...  If any of you are planning to visit Las Vegas during this poker spectacle, let me know, and I'll be happy to show you around.  If any of you are planning a visit to Vegas anytime, just give me a heads up like these friends did, and I'll try to get together with you for at least a photo op.

Kyleigh

Nick

Cheryl

Aaron

Katie

and Michaela.

After Kyleigh and Nick, I learned to actually get in the photos, and I'll have to make sure to get shots with Cindy and Emmy the next time that I see them in town.  Maybe I'll post some pictures with my Vegas friends, or include some photos of the sights of the city someday, as I've been promising....  :P  

Now it's time for some bathroom humor, or "toilet humor," if you will.  You don't ever get this from me, but stay with me...  I was recently in a restroom at a local casino..., doing what you do in a restroom.  I suddenly heard this guy wandering around, yelling, "PETE?!  PETE?!  ARE YOU IN HERE?!"  I don't know if Pete was drunk, or if the guy looking for him was drunk, or both, but Pete was missing evidently.  THEN Pete's friend starts knocking on the door of EVERY STALL, in search of his lost buddy.  "PETE?!  PETE?!"  When my door was knocked on, I didn't answer, because I'm not Pete.  Then I hear this guy talking to another member of the search party, as to whether or not Pete was in my stall evidently...  "No, that guy had black old man shoes..."  For starters, I realized that Pete's friend had looked under the door of my stall.  Secondly, I realized that Nike has a potential new marketing slogan for their black Air Monarchs...  

Black Old Man Shoes

There's never a dull moment in Las Vegas...  :)  That's all for tonight my friends, but have a great weekend, and I'll see you soon!

Hello Again

Good afternoon everyone.  It seems that time got away from me since the last time that we visited.  I just looked back in the archives, and the last time that I posted here was December 6th, so..., HAPPY NEW YEAR!!  With the football season just coming to a close, I will probably have a little more time to write.  For those times when you don't find a new post here, I have about a gazillion older posts in the archives.  Gazillion, 630, same thing.  This little blog was born on September 28th, 2011, and this entry will put it over 110,000 page views.  For those of you who are new here, 'Bikini Hill' overlooks the San Marcos River on the campus of my alma mater, Southwest Texas State University (now known as Texas State University).  I tell you that not only to get the newcomers up to speed, but also because I have a lot of great photos of this spot saved in my phone that I've been wanting to post here...

Okay, the first four photos revolve around Bikini Hill and the river, while the last four are random shots of that amazing campus.  In case the topic ever comes up, I love my alma mater...  :)

And as far as 'The Strip' part of the blog title is concerned, I'm currently living in Las Vegas, Nevada.  As much as I love Texas, and more specifically, San Marcos, I can play poker 24/7 here, and wagering on a wide variety of sports is also readily accessible.  Actually, I have been working in a trio of sportsbooks since the end of August, taking bets and enjoying life.  As far as my wagering is concerned, I bet on football more than all of the other sports combined, so I'll continue to play more poker as I hopefully continue to write more.  For those of you who are friends of mine on Facebook, I recently shared a pair of statues from the Las Vegas Review Journal which gave a recap of the betting on Sunday's Super Bowl.  In case you haven't already heard, this Super Bowl generated a record of 138.5 million dollars wagered in the state of Nevada.  Speaking to the game itself, I don't know how this group of Atlanta Falcons will ever get over giving up that 28-3 lead and losing the game.  While we're on the subject of the Super Bowl, my brother Pete predicted the exact final score of the game, Patriots 34  Falcons 28, in my blog here.  Pete, my friend Joey, and myself gave our favorite weekly bets throughout the football season at 'Coach's Parlay Card,' and we included score predictions when the playoffs arrived.  Pete also struck it big just before Christmas at the Sunset Station bowling lanes, as he threw a perfect 300 game and an 820 series.  This is Pete...

Let me go on the record now that I'll include a photo of Pete in the blog every time that he bowls a perfect 300 game and/or picks the exact score of the Super Bowl.  :)  Nice job Pete...

As for me, I wrote quite a few bets and worked a little bit of overtime in the days leading up to and including the Super Bowl, and the NCAA Tournament in March is supposed to be our next big uptick in business.  I also played a substantial amount of poker over the past month, which included cashing in three consecutive Monday freeroll tournaments at the Falmingo, for $250.00, $250.00, and $150.00, respectively.  I see a lot more poker in my future as we bid our farewell to winter (it's currently 66 degrees in Las Vegas) and eagerly anticipate this summer's World Series of Poker, and the return of football in the fall.  As I've promised my Facebook friends, and now you, I'll eventually get around to posting more photos of Las Vegas for you.

I think that's all that I've got for you today, but I SHOULD post again in the next week to ten days...  :)  See ya soon my friends...