Just a quickie to say I've just played for 21 hours straight and it was a winning session getting back 70% of my losses on this trip Now I have read in some poker literature (possibly written by me) that 21 hours is a tad above the time you can play optimally actually its a tad over the time you can optimally see straight To be honest all that needs to be thrown out the window on a Saturday night in Vegas. It's utter madness. I played in the 2-5 at mgm. now bare in mind this game has a 500 buy in cap at 4am I would guess that there was at least 11k on the table (9 handed) Players play reckless and its all about macho and not being pushed around. The swings can be rough but if you wait for hands and pick your spots you can make some abnormal profit. By 7am we were playing 4 and 5 handed and it was all a bit sick but lucrative, When several middle aged men arrived looking refreshed and as though they'd actually slept it was time to finally leave I want to die in a no limit game on a vegas saturday night

Losing at poker sucks. It sucks hard - and it also blows... which apprently means the same thing. So far this trip I've been beat up, weed on and generally brutalised. Don't panic I'm not going to break the habit of a lifetime and start telling bad beat stories - I haven't had many in the classic mold. The story of my trip is every time I have a hand they have a bigger one and thats difficult to play against. I've made some good laydowns in fact my new specialised poker subject is losing the minimum....ask me how. The side of poker that isn't talked about too much but will affect your results a lot (once you can play) is emotional control. You need to play with confidence and make good decisions even if you're having a losing run. I'm doing okay with it but its not fun. Still play through it I say... that or drink myself to death and the cocktails are complimentary..... Watched the WSOP money bubble burst yesterday - it was a really great piece of poker theatre. Staged managed and very dramatic. The short stacks were desperately trying to hang on as their friends and relatives nearly died on the rail. Then the room exploded when the bubble finally burst and they were all in the money. Many of them satellited in so had just won 22k of almost pure profit so you can understand the elation - it was something to see. Right I'm back off to my bitter barn

Hello from Vegas. Hello from the city of lights and dreams. Hello from Adult Summer camp. The last time I was here for the World Series was six years ago when it was still at Binions. It filled their room in the top floor with maybe 30 poker tables with another room downstairs for satellites. There was very little commercial activity - except maybe the odd guy trying to sell a book he wrote. Well; things have changed. This year the World Series has literally blown my face off. (not literally of course or typing this would be hard, I love it when our increasingly infantile media do that; 'this announcement has literally shaken the world') It's hard to communicate the scale of the thing but the convention room is just a sea of poker tables and players; just incredible. There are also a slew of off pitch activities from sponsors and poker companies. This is poker's FA Cup final, Superbowl and Crufts and some massive trade show I don't know the name of all rolled into one. The main event starts today without me. My qualification attempts both online and live have been shot down in glorious failure. Actually not glorious they've drowned in a sea of either bad beats or card dead tedium. It really really sucks to be out here and not playing it; it sucks so much you're getting no further comment on it. The thing is they're still running satellites; actually right up to the evening of the last day; so I may get sucked in to another try or 4. Last night was party night on the eve of the series with several sponsors throwing bashes so I'm typing this a tiny weeny bit worse for wear. The last party was at a gentlemen's club; which is the most inappropriate name for a strip joint you can think of absolutely no evidence I can think of. Due to the influence of alcohol and being literally forced to try and fit in I...reluctantly....commissioned one of the girls for a dance (which for the uninitiated involves very little dancing and a lot of sitting on you in the nude). 5 minutes later she was telling me her life story. On the few occasions I've been to these 'clubs' this always happens to me. Anyway Coco recently lost her mother to cancer and has recovered from a tumour removal herself. Actually she was quite inspiring; perhaps she can inspire me to an 11th hour WSOP qualification.....