OK so I finally made it to vegas a few days ago and I honestly feel like I am the last person to get here. I was ready to go home after about 4 weeks last year so I didn't want to be here from late May until late July like a lot of people are going to be this year. I was planning to play the $2500 PLO event at the Rio on Tuesday, but I stayed up playing a mixed game until 8am that morning and hate having to wake up after only getting a few hours sleep so I skipped it. I'll most likely play the 5k and 10k PLO events as well as the main event though. I'm also going to be at the two remaining Cardrunners parties so come say hi if you see me there.

As far as online play goes I started playing a lot of 6max hands again recently and a lot on pokerstars for the first time since early March. I was going to post some graphs or results like I usually do but I forgot to update the database on my laptop before I left for vegas so I don't have any of the hh's on this computer. I was up about 36k in EV and 26k in actual dollars over 28k hands since my last blog before I left for vegas. I then proceeded to run 8k below EV and -8k overall in 3500 hands since I've been here so I am going to force myself not to play 5/10 or 10/20 again until I get some momentum back. Like I said in my last blog it's always a good idea to play lower stakes than your normal game when you have been running bad even if you are rolled for bigger games. It took me years to finally learn that lesson but I'm really glad I finally did.

I've also been playing a lot of 8-game mix on pokerstars lately, mostly at 10/20 and 20/40. I've always been interested in playing all the games so I feel that I'm at least competent in all of them. I think my weakest games are stud hi and 0maha8 but I've improved a lot recently. I'm definitely up a good bit in the 8-game on pstars so I'm feeling pretty confident in them at the moment. I also played in a great live mixed game the other night which consisted of PLO, PLO/8, NL 2-7 single draw, 2-7 triple draw, and badugi. It was 20/40 for a while and then 9/18 towards the end and there was a lot of action to say the least...

I've spent a ton of time in vegas the past 4 years, well over 100 days, and this place never ceases to amaze me. I'm going to just list a few random thoughts and things that have happened since I've been here.

1. Aria is only about 6 months old and the other day I noticed that the paint is already completely stripped off around the credit card slots on the ATM machines. I guess they've been getting a lot of use...
2. There is something so awesome about being able to order gourmet beef carpaccio at 4am.
3. There are enough dimes in this town to end the recession.
4. Game 7 of the NBA finals was absolute craziness here, there were at least 100 people crowded around every tv in the casinos and bars.
5. For the second time in the past couple months Flava Flav randomly walked up next to me at a craps table and started playing. The odds of that happening have to be astronomical but it honestly doesn't even seem that strange here in vegas.
6. People wearing sunglasses in a 4/8 fixed limit game never cease to amuse me.
7. There have been big mixed games running every night in the Ivey Room at Aria. It was 400/800 for a while and then went up to 600/1200 last night. Notable players I've seen in the game include David Williams, Michael Mizrachi, Daniel Alaei, and Jean-Robert Bellande(lol).

I'm most likely going to go see Sean Tyas play at the Perfecto event at Rain on Saturday night. The Perfecto events @ Rain and XS are my two favorite nightlife places in vegas. XS is just unbelievably nice and usually has the best crowd of females in vegas from what I've seen, and Rain brings in the top-ranked DJ's in the world for Perfecto on Saturday nights and has a ton of things going on that are just visually stunning. You definitely need to get a table if you are going to either one though, if you don't you will be standing in very crowded areas all night and have to wait forever at the bar to get a drink. Here is a clip of Perfecto @ Rain for those of you who haven't been:

http://www.n9negroup.com/las-vegas.n9negroup.com/downloads/5.html

On to the World Cup. I have become a big football(soccer) fan in my adult life which is unusual considering most people don't follow it here in the U.S. and I didn't even play the sport when I was growing up. Despite the fact that we aren't considered one of the best teams in the world I am still first and foremost a team U.S.A. fan. We clearly got lucky on the goal against England, but I don't think there was any doubt we looked like the better team in the second half and had a very good chance to win the game. I just finished watching our game vs. Slovenia and I honestly don't think I've felt more emotion watching a sporting event since the Texas/USC game when Vince Young became a legend. I'm pretty sure I woke up everyone on my floor with all the screaming I did at the tv. The official who was in charge of the game is an absolute disgrace and has no business officiating a youth league game much less one in a World Cup. Thierry Henry's handball goal to get France into the World Cup has to be the blown call of the century, but the disallowed goal in the closing minutes of the U.S. game has to be a close second. It wasn't just that one call though, the guy just completely blew countless calls throughout the entire game. What a disgrace to the sport.

As far as other teams go, Argentina is looking like an extremely scary team at this point. There is absolutely no doubt that Lionel Messi is the best player in the world. When you watch him play it honestly feels like he is going to score or at least create a very good chance every time he touches the ball. Also the vuvezalas and the ball they are using are huge mistakes on FIFA's part imo.

Finally I just want to mention a few huge complaints I have with Apple. First of all, it is such a joke how you always have to wait for 2+ hours when you go into an Apple store before anyone will speak to you or even ring you up for a simple purchase. Secondly, they make it so damn difficult to get windows working properly on a macbook. You would think a company with tons of brilliant people working for it could figure out how to fix these things. Tilts me to no end...

gl gl

Matthew