Was it enough?

I did make the points last night, but not being adept at advanced math (or at least the logarithm part) I have no clue if I earned enough points to take over first for May....11th out of 75 in a $11 buy in...you math whizzes know how much that was worth? I guess I'll find out soon enough when Al updates the standings if I got more than the 59.9 points I needed (my hunch is no, although JD felt differently last night). Regardless, the month should have a thrilling ending Sunday night as I try to make a second last-minute comeback for a monthly win. In March, I took over first on the pentultimate event and secured the lead on Sunday. I feel this time I am probably behind going into the last tournament, but we will see...

I am getting the Vegas itch again after reading the early reports from the WSOP. Today is Event #1, the $10,000 Pot-Limit Hold'em Championship. They are running lots of "championship" events these days. If you haven't done so yet, go over to Full Tilt Poker and pick your fantasy team: https://www.fulltiltpoker.com/series-2008-fantasy-poker for a free and fun chance at prizes and freeroll entries.

I booked my flight yesterday through United for Monday, June 23. Leave B'ham at 6:40 p.m. CST and arrive in Vegas 10:40 PST. Another of those late nights...and probably midnight dinner in the Binion's Coffeeshop. Not sure when I will return home, though I hope it is as a member of what Harrah's is dubbing the "November Nine." (Am I the only one who thinks they are ripping off "Lost"?)

I will be writing some for the man himself -- Dan Michalski -- over at Pokerati.com, so be sure to check that out. Still looking for more work if anyone knows of any.

I've developed a tentative schedule of some events I'd like to play. Plans rarely hold to form, and I'm sure something more interesting will pop up on some of these days, but for now we have:

June 24 $225 NLHE @ Caesars...probably won't happen due to my late night on the 23rd
June 25 $230 O/8 @ Golden Nugget
June 26 $150 NLHE @ Binion's
June 27 $330 NLHE @ Venetian
June 28 $330 NLHE @ Caesars
June 29 $1,500 HORSE @ WSOP....freeroll baby!
June 30 $225 NLHE @ Caesars
July 1 $230 HORSE @ Golden Nugget
July 2 $225 NLHE @ Caesars
July 3 $200 NLHE @ Binion's

That's a total of $2,145 in entry fees, $1,920 if you take off June 24 (I made this schedule when I thought I was flying in on Sunday). Pretty small stakes for many of you kiddies out there (large stakes my wife would argue...it's all relative). It depends how I am doing. If I bomb out of early ones I may regroup. And, as always, I will be playing plenty of satellites, which seem to be my bread and butter so I rarely pay full price for entries. I am pretty sure that if I win a second 2K package in the BBT I will put it toward these and WSOP satellites. I love that Harrah's has moved the satellites into their own room (according to the map I saw in the press kit I think they are in the room that the poker kitchen was in last year) so I will probably spend a lot of time in there. As a side note, I am terrible at online SNGs so as to why I excel at land-based SNGs is a mystery to even me.

I think it's fantastic the tournament options there are in town this summer for us low rollers. If anything, I'll err more toward Caesars and Venetian with their deep stack structures. The Venetian also has good satellites, and if you've never been there be advised that it's the best poker room in Vegas.

Thanks again to Al and anyone else who organized the BBT. Thanks to them I am freerolling in one WSOP event with another $1,250 to put toward the travel of my wife and me. I am very fortunate.