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Tao-O-Ween

11*11*09

Last week I got really sick. But not in the usual, crazy gambling way. I think I somehow contracted Swine Flu. I didnít go out at all and felt awful. On the upside ñ yes, thereís always an upside ñ I played a ton of online poker and had a nicely profitable run. I clocked 20,000 or so hands, which qualifies as the most volume Iíve gotten in over the last two years. The ante PLO games on FullTilt had a ton of action, and that is great if youíre in the mood to gamble. Obviously, I was.

I started feeling better a few days before Halloween and celebrated my newly renewed health by going to Tao with a bunch of friends. Many of them had just gotten back from Europe and the EPT. So there was lots to catch up on. We had the best table in the club and figured we were ballers. Then we looked at the groups on either side of us. They got into a Cristal war ñ competing to see who could order more. Their bottles came six at a time while we got two-for-one on vodka.

We didnít spend nearly as much as they did, but we still had a damned fine time, chugging Patron and generally going off. One girl got down on all fours while the rest of us danced. That was good for a laugh, but it got even funnier when I found out that sheís from Michigan. Yeah, thatís how we do it back home.

Tao proved to be a pretty good warm-up for Halloween. Antonio Esfandiari had a dinner party at his condo. He had his regular guy cooking, so the food, as always, was delicious. The girls all seemed to be half-naked, and my buddy Alec Torelli was in town and partying, which was a nice surprise.

He had made a $200,000 triathlon bet with Ashton ìtheASHMAN103î Griffin. Whoever finishes in a shorter time wins the money. Alec was training hard when Ashman went on a $1.5-million downswing online. Suddenly the prop bet seemed less important and he didnít train at all. So, right before Halloween, Ashman bought out of the bet for 100K. That was the easiest money Alec had ever made. He was pumped and having a great time at Antonioís.

I couldnít take my eyes off the female bartender, who was dressed up as a super sexy sailor and had a pretty heavy hand when it came to pouring out the shots. Comic relief came from some 19-year-old kid who happened to wander in uninvited. Nobody knew who he was and, briefly, he had the time of his life ñ until it became too good of a time. That kid spent most of his night yakking off of the balcony,

Everything else was going great until the speaker system blew out and pretty much killed the party. But it probably saved the cops a trip to Antonioís condo, which is the way these kinds of bashes usually end. After things wound down, I went home and fell asleep relatively early, which was nice for a change.

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23

10*21*09

Guys have birthdays and fly clear across the country to celebrate in Las Vegas. When I turned 23, last week, I didnít need to go anywhere. A five minute limo ride from my condo and I was smack in the middle of the Strip. As you might expect, I had a blast.

It started in the Joint at the Hard Rock. My friend Alan Meltzer played a major role in breaking the band Creed, and they happened to be playing on the night of my birthday. To help celebrate, he hosted me and a bunch of our poker buddies ñ including Keith Gibson, Brian Rast, Dan Blitz, Bob Wright, and dates — in a skybox at the Joint. That meant a full open bar, scantily clad cocktail waitresses, lots of great food, and a perfect view of the show. Creed sounded fantastic, the singer was super into it, and the crowd flipped out. We got to hang backstage with the band, took pictures, chatted them up, and generally had an awesome time.

After the show, though, thatís when things really heated up. One of my buddies managed to snag the Hugh Hefner Suite at the Palms. Itís everything youíd imagine: beds as big as Bentleys, pictures of naked girls everywhere, a hot-tub on the terrace. Itís pretty easy to get a bunch of good-looking girls excited about partying up there, and, yeah, we had plenty. The drinks were flowing, and I got pretty deep into the Patron. My friends and I played rock, paper, scissor, with the loser needing to take a shot. I didnít do too well at the game, but if there was a contest to see who could drink the most tequila, I probably would have won.

We were in a totally pimped-out suite, and it was loaded with sexy, drunk girls who outnumbered us three-to-one. A few of them were taking naked pictures of each other upstairs, others were messing around in the hot tub, and one stripped naked for a half-dozen black chips. Apparently, she had starred in a lesbian porn film on the Net.

To give you an idea of how sick my friends and I are, though, can you guess what we were doing amidst all of that decadence? Thatís right, we began playing poker ñ and the quality of play, as you can imagine, was not particularly high. There must have been 20 girls crowded around the table, watching. Most intent of all, though, was The Girl. I promised that if I won a certain amount of money, Iíd buy her a pair of Dolce & Gabbana boots that sheís been lusting after. I didnít win enough to warrant her getting the boots, but, believe me, she was sweating the action like you wouldnít believe.

It was a great birthday, made all the better the next morning when some guys came by my apartment to shoot a pickup scene for the reality show thatís being done on Alec Torelli and I. Luckily I had a couple girls from the party staying over, and they were willing to participate in the shoot. Letís just say that we wound up with some interesting footage.

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A Trip To LA

09*27*09

I managed to spend a week or so in Las Vegas before hitting the road again. This time I was driving to L.A. with the girl that Iím seeing (heretofore known as The Girl). Gnarly traffic added a couple hours to what should have been a four-hour drive. But things began looking up after we got to West Hollywood in time to have dinner with my friends Keith Gibson and Brian Rast.

Keith and Brian are both high-stakes poker pros. We play in a lot of the same games and theyíre always fun to hang out with. We ate in a nice, healthy Italian restaurant called Pace before heading to Le Deaux, which is supposed to be the hot club in L.A.

Having spent more than my share of time in Vegas nightspots, I immediately noticed two key differences: People in L.A. dress a lot more casually, and the girls are definitely less attractive. I donít care about peopleís clothing, but I do care about the girls. Admittedly, though, they seem a more intelligent in L.A. and more adept at holding decent conversations.

The other thing I noticed right away is that nobody in L.A. really cares about us being poker players. In Vegas, being known as a high-stakes player comes with a certain amount of† status. Not the same thing in L.A. Of course, though, when you have two tables and bottle service, you do get noticed a little bit.

Before the night ended, I had to do some gambling. So, on the ride home (The Girl abstained from drinking and served as designated driver), Brian and I played Wits and Wagers. Itís a trivia game that I just happened to have in my car. We went heads up for $100 a question. I finished with a $600 profit but figured that I wasnít getting the best of it. Brian went to Stanford and Iím just a lowly state college dropout. So I definitely dodged a bullet there.
Eating and clubbing are fun, but the real reason for this trip† was to attend a dual birthday party being thrown by Phil Laak and Jennifer Tilly. The cool thing about their set-up in L.A. is that they basically have two houses, right next to each other. One is the house that they live in. The other is a really nice guesthouse. They invited The Girl and I to stay in the guesthouse, and thatís where the party was as well.

I half-jokingly told Jennifer and Phil, ìThat one day I am successful enough that I have one house to live in, and another house for throwing parties and putting up my friends.î

The party, as expected, was great. One interesting thing was the mix of people: half Hollywood types and half poker players. The poker players all hung out together and I think we did most of the drinking.† When I made a comment about the traffic in LA, all of the pro-poker players I talked to said they didn’t leave their house from 1pm to 7pm.† I found this assuming and in mind it kind of defeats the point of living in LA :) .

One person who pretty much straddled both worlds was Shannon Elizabeth.† She plays a bit of poker, but, more importantly for me, she was in American Pie.† I saw her naked about 200 times when I was 12 years old and developed a bit of a crush. But by the time I got drunk enough to approach her, she had already left.

On Sunday, slightly hung over from the party, we moved from Jen and Philís place to Hotel Casa Del Mar in Santa Monica, which I really like. I have to say that when Iím ready to leave Vegas, Santa Monica will be one of the places on my list. Itís right on the ocean, people there look great, and we found some terrific restaurants. These were places that were good and low-key ñ they didnít have the shock and awe of my usual Vegas haunts ñ and all the better for it.

Over the course of our trip, I got The Girl to start gambling with me. Being the vegas girl she is she wants a pair of Dolce & Gabbana boots so I decided to freeroll her for a portion of the boots on every bet. So far, though, she hasn’t won any bets :) .

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