An update on River Belle. I've received a few emails from people with big wins (+$500) off their bonus. Alas, if you didn't jump on it last month, it's too late -- they've finally returned that great signup bonus to what it was previously. Not only did they remove being able to work off the bonus in blackjack (slots only now), but they've decreased the offer by $100. If you'd already signed up, they'll still stick to your old terms and conditions of $10/day for 30 days, and what I'd previously posted will still work.

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More to remind myself, Empire has another quickie reload bonus of 100 percent up to $100 for deposits made between Sept. 4 and 6 with the code PLAYSEP. Thing is, you have to play your 1000 raked hands within three days. Not a problem when you don't have a job.

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The $1000 royals are back at the Station Casinos! For the month of September, anytime you get a royal flush you get $1000. In addition, all in-house bad beat jackpots are doubled to $20,000. The jumbo progressive looks like it'll continue to reset to $200,000.

Excalibur may be continuing double-wheel spins through September, and if this is the case I'll mostly be playing there whenever playing live.

As far as I know, Sunset Station is the only poker room that hands out beepers when you get on their waiting list. I asked the floor at The Palms why they didn't do this (they constantly call people's names throughout the casino; something Sunset doesn't do, and I like them more for it), and they said people would walk with them. They also said their business has been hit since they went nonsmoking. Sam's Town is now nonsmoking, and their business hasn't suffered, but smoke is so ingrained into that casino that you get that nicotine high just breathing. Many locals have moved their puffing and poker playing to Boulder Station.

Similar to Party, Sunset runs an SnG step tournament, and I thought I'd check one out while picking up my free bag cooler.

Steps run Monday-Friday from noon to 6.

Mondays are Step 1, $10+2 for T1000 and another $3 for T200 more. Blinds begin T25/25 and raise every 15 minutes. Top 2 win seats into Step 2 ($50+5).

A decent enough structure. I got there before Monday at 6 p.m. ready to play, but they seem to have a difficult time filling seats. Sat in a 3/6/9 and had many playable hands that went nowhere on the flop.

The best hand I had was one I played the worst. I'm BB with 33, many limpers, and a flop of 3-4-4. I check, and it checks through. Turn is a 10. I bet, two people call. River is a 10. I check-fold when it's bet and then raised. One had K-10, other had A-10.

Awful, awful play. And I know better.

Down $70 while waiting for the tournament, meaning I could've just bought in to Step 2 directly.

Finally the tourney went off a bit after 7.

I began with the button and two people went out before the blinds got to me. Just like Party.

UTG raised 4x the blinds, two limpers, and I go all-in with the first hand I've played -- QQ. UTG calls with 88, another calls with JJ, and guy to my right who said he had pocket 10s folds. None of the four outs shows, and the Hiltons hold up.

After that, I couldn't catch anything. We're down to three with one guy a massive chip leader. Guy to my right is about even stacked, but then he wins two big pots and now they're both even and I'm wasting away.

I make a move with J6s but am called with AK, and I'm out on the bubble.

I know I can win one of these.

Yesterday after picking up my free nature sound machine and buffeting at The Palms, I headed back to Sunset at 6 p.m. Put my name down for Step 2, but two hours later they were still at a half-filled table and it didn't go off.

Played 3/6/9 for a few hours and at one point was up $120 but lost a couple big pots (including KK vs. AA twice) and finally left when 10-3s made a runner flush (me, I was drawing for an open-ended straight, but at least my draw was flopped). Ended with +$33. A win's a win.

I now have over 50 hours for the $250,000 freeroll on Sept. 10.

Just for kicks, I tallied my data from both Palace and Sunset since July 1, when qualifying for the tournament began.

At Palace, I played 23.5 hours and lost $318.

At Sunset, I played 42 hours and lost $522.

Which means I'm paying $840 for this "freeroll." I would need to get 20th place just to break even (11th-20th pays $1000).

As Jim Norton would say, I stink.

It's time to rethink low-limit poker and concentrate on no-limit. (Incidentally, I checked my Excalibur stats since July 1 and put in 35.5 hours and won $631.)

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Back to the weekend recap...


Saturday

Tournament Players Club. One of the reasons for taking advantage of Sahara's free nights was to be close to Summerlin where I was invited to play in a practice run of the tentatively titled World Wide Blackjack Tour, for broadcast next year. Some big investors are behind this thing, with many top blackjack players flying in from all over. They're taking a page from the World Poker Tour and are glitzing it up.

I can't mention specifics, particularly the tournament rules that they've tweaked and are still working on. However, what they've added opens a host of new strategies that will play very well on TV. Even at my table, the new rules made the game even more exciting. My gut reaction is they have a hit on their hands (then again, that same gut told me my pocket Queens were good last night). This is the excitement that the WPT people must have felt before they launched.

Bottled sodas (Diet Coke!) in ice are set out in the hall beneath photos of Howard Hughes and Howard Hughes' golf clubs. Red Bull coolers contain bottled water but no Red Bull. Tease.

Check in at the front and Jessica says in a British accent, "You look really clean." I don't know how to take this, until I see that my "Grubby" name was also on the callsheet. I smile and say, "You should see when I eat," then write "Grubby" on my nametag.

Nine blackjack tables are set up with decks of cards from different casinos. The dealers come from casinos and are familiar with blackjack tournaments. There are no chairs for the players, which will be corrected in the final rounds, but I actually enjoyed playing standing up and crouching down to scrutinize others' stacks. I wonder if not being able to countdown a player's chips is part of the strategy or an oversight.

Looking around at the competition, the announcer says that if this were a real tournament, he'd be "scared shitless."

Not one for the public eye, I try to avoid the camera crew that roams the room, interviewing players.

Everyone seems to know each other, having played in tournaments together. Me, I know no one. I recognize a few names as blackjack authors and players, but no one's face is familiar. Someone wears a nametag that says "Monk," a girl walks around called "Moneytaker."

As part of the country club rules, we couldn't wear jeans or sneakers, but other than that we were encouraged to be creative. They're on the hunt for personalities, not math whizzes, they said. Some had on sunglasses (cue poker, they've added an element of bluffing to the game). I wore what I call my bowling shirt, along with gray socks and black dress shoes. That's the extent of my style.

Once the tourney began, I held my own and felt respect as I placed my bets dependent on others' stacks. Much like poker, tournaments in blackjack are all about position and bet amounts. Also like poker where it might be conducive to play outside premium hands, in a blackjack tournament there may be cause for splitting 10s, doubling-down on cards above 11 or blackjacks, and surrendering.

This is why I think a casino or online casino should sponsor the Tour. If this gets popular, it will only make blackjack more profitable for the casino when players deviate from basic strategy.

There was no buy-in for this practice tournament, but they offered prizes for the top two -- first place was $12,000 and second place was $8,000.

I bubble out on the first table. I'd go more into the hand, but it involves one of the rules they've altered. Suffice to say, it does come down to more luck than poker. You are, after all, still relying on a good hand from and against the dealer.

As far as I'm concerned, the entire room contains nothing but lucky people, because how can you consistently win in blackjack?

The next practice run is in Los Angeles next month. I may attend, this time in red socks.

Rather than watch the tournament to the end, where they had a catered dinner, I decide to head back to Sahara and try to make the murder mystery. I haven't seen a play since Los Angeles, and even a bad one might do me some good.


Palace Station. Pick up my free large salad bowl. As I pass by the poker room, I mutter curses under my breath as the progressive jackpot had hit (at Sunset Station again). There were so few people at the time, that after the $20K/$35K split for the beat hands, every player received $2040! One of the bloggers happened to be playing when it hit, but he hasn't yet mentioned it in his blog so I won't spoil who it was. But way to go, Mr. S.! At least they reset the progressive to $200K again (rather than the $100K).


Sahara. Make it to the murder mystery, load up on Capt&Cokes, and prepare for the worst. To be fair, it isn't that bad. The actors give it their all, and it's pretty fun. Still community theater level, but fun.

I get into the mystery aspect of it, throwing out questions and observations. They make it easy by leading you toward hints and questions to ask that are found beneath the table centerpiece. I first suspected one person and when I see him walk away with a bottle of the victim's Jack Daniels, I assumed he'd been poisoned. Questioning the suspect to the whereabouts of said Jack Daniels, he said, "Good idea, wrong track."

And they had another rule: everyone had to tell the truth, except the killer. Knowing this, it's easy to narrow down who the killer is -- a direct question such as, "Did you kill him?" was enough, and the killer would simply avoid the question. A bit tougher was getting at the method and motive, and I figure it out but am not one of the five winning entries that are drawn and given $250 and a t-shirt.

Doing this kind of investigating reminded me of playing Infocom's murder mystery text adventure game "Deadline" (and later, "Witness" and "Suspect"). You sometimes had to be at the right place at the right time, but if you stuck around long enough and asked characters about other characters, you eventually had a sense of the overall picture. "Deadline," however, was difficult enough that I was exhilarated once solving it. That would go for any of Infocom's games, where I learned to type by playing "Zork."

The dinner buffet includes venison, which I'd never had before. They're cut in little pieces, and for all I know it could be monkey brains. Once I get my head around eating Bambi, it's pretty tasty.

Interesting that we have words for eating animals -- cow is beef, calf is veal, pig is pork, deer is venison, yet chicken is chicken. I guess "fowl" just never caught on.

While in the buffet line, I get a call from Carla and I tell her I'm in a murder mystery but the murder hasn't happened yet and for all I know it could be death by food poisoning. I say it loud enough to get a reaction from the other people in the line, but they are unamused. We make plans to hook up for poker afterwards.

At my table sat Gloria who designs lamps for hotel guest rooms, including the new Redrock Station casino.

People talk about MGM and Harrah's running all of Vegas, but a good investment would be in the Station Casinos. They're quietly sitting on a ton of property in Vegas, they've captured all of the local market, and not only do they run the Stations but many smaller casinos as well. In 10, 20 years, don't be surprised if the Stations sneak up and put a bid in for the underperforming casinos that MGM/Harrah's hasn't bought out yet and then quietly take over.

Gloria and her friend seemed just there for the food. When it came time to question the suspects, I was volunteered to ask the questions. Yet it wasn't a per-table team effort, we were all in this for ourselves.


The Orleans. Meet Carla and sit at her NL table. Pleased to see she puts in some solid play with position bets and strong folds, and it'll be fun hanging out with her at the poker rooms. This big burly dude in the 10seat had it in for her, constantly calling her raises and drawing out on her.

One hand I had K9s, which I fold to Carla's raise. Flop is K-J-10. I feel good about my fold as Carla and the 10seat go at it. Turn is a K. River is a 9, which she check-folds to the guy's all-in bet. He says good fold, he was setting a trap. But as he didn't show his cards and knowing what cards he did play, I doubt he had anything but a Queen draw. I later ask Carla if she had a King, and she says yes. My guess was AK.


Excalibur. Carla and I head to the Castle, which she'd never been to before. We sit in separate NL games. Mine has a donator who's constantly going all-in and rebuying. Unfortunately, he's three to my left and two to my left are players with $1000 and $600 in front of them.

One hand is raised UTG. I have AKo and call. I seldom 3bet with AK, one of my weaknesses. Flop is A-K-x. Bettor throws out $50 and I call, intending to raise the turn. Turn is A. He bets $100 and I think a bit. I know my hand is good, but I'm hoping I lose so that we win the bad beat jackpot which is at $4500 (considerably less than the Stations', but I'll take it). I raise him all-in, and as soon as he calls I figure we have the same hand. We do, and we chop, losing money to the rake, drop, and tip.

Unlike The Orleans, Excalibur lets me see many flops for cheap. Most of my hands hold up, including pocket Aces, which I'm glad about because the wheel spin -- even doubled -- wouldn't compensate losing with pocket Aces in a no-limit game.


Sunday

Fiesta Rancho. This was my second reason for staying at Sahara.

Every month, Fiesta Rancho (North Las Vegas, next to Texas Station) runs a $50 buy-in tournament with a guaranteed $5000 pool and guaranteed $3000 first prize. Only top 3 pay, and 4th through 10th get dopey prizes like gift certificates to their restaurants and Fiesta apparel suitable for washing your car.

But there's no fee, and all the money is returned to the players. Plus every signup receives a t-shirt and a $10 voucher for next month's tourney.

Eleven-handed tables are squished into the bar and outside. Many alternates, for 120 total people. Before the first orbit, three people go out and are immediately replaced with an alternate.

Our dealer is new, makes plenty of mistakes, and is so slow that the blinds go up every orbit. Beginning at T25/50 and starting with T1000 didn't give much room to work with. Particularly when blinds jump from T200/400 to T500/1000.

I build up a good stack pushing with AK, AQ, QQ, and K10s. Of course, K10 is the only hand that's called, but I flop an open-ended straight flush and win with a straight.

Then I get QQ in the cut-off and raise 4x. BB raises all-in. Another caller also goes all-in.

I cover both and get T350 back.

I'm up against AJ and A6. I'll take it.

Flop is Q-K-J (K and Q are ).

Turn and river are s.

AJ wins with J and says he thought he was good since I'd raised before with K10.

He later felt incredibly guilty about the hand, because he kept apologizing.

Manage to double up twice, but hard to work with T350, and I'm out after another orbit in about 28th place.

I eat McDonald's and order the ranch BLT combo. Then realize after I paid, their display included coupons for it.

Heading out, I spot a brand new Men in Black slot machine called Men in Black: Galactic Payback, making it the third one in the series and having more sequels than the movies. It isn't as fun or as advanced as the first two, but I play anyway.

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Since you've read this far, you deserve some sort of reward.

This link will get you a free hour of play at any GameWorks. Including, of course, the Vegas location.

An email with your free hour will be sent in a couple days, but you'll only have 30 days before it expires, so plan your Vegas trip accordingly.