Signing off from Vegas

Well my battery is dying and the plug doesn’t work so I’ve got to be quick…

Unfortunately, I caught a nasty cold that had me down for the count the last two days of the WSOP. I tried to soldier on for a bit on Thursday, but just couldn't cut it and headed for the comfort of my MGM bed.

Congratulations to Jamie Gold for achieving the dream 8,772 fellow main event participants had. May Gold be a great ambassador for the game as it gears up for what will be a major discussion with Congress in the coming years on the future of online poker. There's no doubt the effect that the online game has had on the growth of poker offline (8,773 participants in the WSOP being proof number one) and to pull the plug on the online game would certainly reverberate within the real world poker community.

It's always sad to see the WSOP come to an end. There is no other tournament like it in the world; truly nothing comes close. Other tournaments offer trophies, rings or watches to the winners, but there is nothing that compares to a WSOP bracelet. Thousands of professional, intermediate and rank amateur players traveled to their Mecca this summer. Most of them went home empty handed (or with empty wallets), but almost all of them returned with great stories and the experience of a lifetime.

Of course, this also ends my one-year poker journey and I’ll have much more to say about that when I have the time.

I was to stay for BARGE, but after five weeks in this town I’m a bit sick of it and ready to go home so I changed my flight until tomorrow. There’s also the matter of this girl…

I met Amy shortly before leaving for Vegas and we’ve talked a lot since I’ve been here and we’re both eagerly anticipating our second date. (Kind of glad nothing happened with that “Karen” girl now that I think about it). If that’s not a good enough reason to head home, I don’t know what is. There’s also a grad school orientation taking place on the 19th that might prove useful. So home I head.

I drove by the Panorama Towers every day for a week as I commuted from the MGM to the Rio and dreamed of the riches that would allow me to live there. But the more I think about it, the things I need in life I’ve already got and they’re all back home in Alabama.