Seat 2: Phil Ivey
Seat 3 Johnny Chan
Seat 4: Me
Seat 5: Gus Hansen
Seat 6: Lee Salem
Seat 7: Doyle Brunson
Seat 8: Chau Giang
We were playing 8 games:
Hold’em
Omaha H/L
Stud
Stud H/L
No Limit Hold’em (1000-2000 blinds with a 1000 ante)
Pot Limit Omaha (1000-2000 blinds)
2-7 Triple Draw
2-7 Single Draw No Limit (1000-2000 blinds with a 1000 ante)
All of the pot/no limit games have a cap on them where you can “only” lose $100,000 on a hand. The first capped pot I played was against Johnny Chan in pot limit Omaha. The flop came A-J-7 with two spades.
My hand: A-J-J-3
Chan’s hand: 7-7-9-10
We both put $100,000 in on the flop and Chan caught an 8 on the river for a gut shot straight. That had me down about $130,000 early.
The next capped I played was against Chau Giang. This time the flop came K-7-6.
My hand: K-7-9-A
Chau’s hand: K-7-8-A
Yup, I lost that one too! So losing two capped pots at 100 dimes a pop had me stuck about $170,000. I continued to get drilled in pot limit Omaha all night losing yet another capped pot to Phil Ivey later in the evening. All told I’m certain the game cost me at least half a million.
I played for 8 hours, till 8:30am this morning and for the last few hours it was three handed: Ivey, Reese, and myself. We were all tired and decided to quit so that we could play again today. Total damage for me was manageable considering the stakes and how I ran in the game, -$251,000.
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Before I went into play I was on a very important phone call. I saw a couple posts in the forum questioning my relationship and whether or not I’m still getting married. Well as of last night, the relationship is officially over and I’m a single man.
This wasn’t something that happened over night mind you. I think we both knew for quite some time that the differences between us were just to great to continue. We get along great for the most part, but there a few “minor” issues that we had trouble with. You know, politics, religion, raising kids, that sort of thing!
None of this changes the fact that Lori has had an absolutely life changing influence on me. I’m a much better person for meeting her, and I hope that she feels the same way. I have nothing bad to say about her at all. She is a great woman with the purest heart of anyone I’ve ever met. She’s never done anything to hurt anyone. In fact, I don’t think she’s capable of something like that.
In the end, I think we were both “good people” who just weren’t right for each other. I think we both feel good about the decision and are genuinely relieved that we realized this now rather than waiting until after we were married.
I don’t want any sympathy e-mails or pity posts! I’m truly fine with it and I know that it was the right decision to make for both of us. As for me finding someone new, that’s simply not a priority in my life at all. In some ways I feel like the life I chose makes it difficult for a woman to cope.
I don’t know what’s in store for me on that front, but I’m honestly not too preoccupied with it. I have a million other things going on in my life to keep me busy. A great group of friends, poker, business, etc.
Good night all, it’s 9:30am here and I need to rest up for the big game tonight.]]>
I woke up at around 2:30pm in the afternoon in my hotel room here at the Wyndam near the Commerce. It’s 12:38am and I’m still in my hotel room here at the Commerce. Not kidding, I haven’t been outside this room the whole day and it doesn’t look like I’m headed out anytime soon. So what then, what exactly have i been doing for the past ten hours? Well I ordered room service twice. For lunch I had the lasagna and for dinner I had one of my specialty sandwiches: The clubhouse sandwich. Grilled Sourdough stacked with shaved smoked turkey, ham, thick sliced bacon, Swiss cheese, lettuce, tomato, pickle, red onion and fries. Of course I tweak that a little bit as usual and hold the pig, both bacon and ham, and hold any other dead stuff that don’t belong in my sammich! Other than that I’ve been staring at a computer screen the whole day. I spent most of my day playing poker online at www.pokermountain.com. Up until today I haven’t been able to win a pot at the site but today I finally broke through. My best finish in a Quick start tournament was 5th coming into the day and my new poker goal was to do better than 5th! In the first two I played I made my usual 10th place exit. I’m happy to report though that I’m on a little hot streak. I won the last $20 Quick start and finished second in the one before that. Poker Mountain is doing all kinds of new promotions. I’m assuming you are all on the mailing list here so I won’t bore you with the details. One of the promotions though is a double bounty on both TJ and I. Knock us out of a Quick start and you win twice the entry fee. If one of us wins it, the guy who finishes second wins the bounty. That made for some interesting calls for sure. For example in the first Quick start I played I got beat by 2-7 off suit. Not so sure he makes the call if it wasn’t for the $40 bounty! Whatever, it was fun. I then jumped into a $3-$6 game and won myself $100 Woohoo! I made four tens, followed by kings full, followed by the nut flush in back to back to back hands. That right there is the most exciting thing that happened to me today… seriously. No Italian mobsters selling me fake watches or DVD players. No crazy traffic jams. No human contact whatsoever! Oh wait that’s a lie the room service guy and I now have a very special bond I think. So after playing online for most of the day I decided to do a little with the site. I haven’t “cleaned up” the forum in a while so I changed the look a bit and added some content. A player profile on Gus Hansen and a new quiz question. I’m too tired to go to the Commerce now but I’m also not tired enough to sleep. Which means, it’s movie time! After looking at the selection I’m leaning towards Sideways over the Incredibles. Both movies got tremendous ratings from the critics so I
50-100
100-200
100-200 (25 ante)
150-300 (50)
200-400 (50)
300-600 (75)
400-800 (100)
500-1000 (100)
600-1200 (200)
800-1600 (200)
1000-2000 (300)
1200-2400 (400)
1500-3000 (500)
That is a far cry from the ridiculous structure we saw in Tunica in January that saw the old 300-600, 500-1000, 800-1600 jump. My hats off to the Commerce once again for giving the players what they want.
The structure is what allowed me to hang in there late on day one with a short stack. I finally went broke with my last 5250 against Freddie Deeb when my pair and flush draw couldn’t outdraw his two KK.
Oh well, I was extremely happy with the way I played today. Despite getting eliminated on day one I think it was one of the better sessions I’ve played all year. If I continue to play like that the breaks will come and I’ll get there again real soon.
So now I have some free time in LA and may use the next few days as a much needed vacation. I’ll probably go visit my good buddies Regev and Oren and reminisce about simpler times.]]>
1 Pair Louis Vitton Black
1 Pair Bernini Beige
1 Pair K-Swiss White
2 Pairs of Socks Beige
7 Pairs of Socks Black
7 Pairs of Sock White
14 Pairs of Underwear
2 Pairs of blue jeans
2 Pairs other color jeans
I Pair of sweatpants and sweatshirt
5 T-Shirts
1 Pair of black jeans
1 Beige Suit
5 Poker Mountain tops
1 Orange sweater (it’s the new black 🙂
3 Striped dress shirts
1 Black mock neck sweater
4 Various tops
2 Hats
2 Belts
1 Phone with Charger
1 Secret item
Toiletries
Poker Vitamins
Valet Ticket (left my truck in Burbank)
Books + Magazines
Camera + Charger
Computer
Leather Jacket
Watches
Money
That might seem like a lot I dunno, but it’s better to have options I always figure.
My flight leaves at 11:45am (no delays hopefully) and gets into Burbank at around 12:50pm. That will give me enough time to head to the Wyndam for a quick shower and then over to the Commerce for the 3:30pm start time.
Not the best way to prepare for a tournament probably, but I’m not too worried honestly. I’m kinda hungry to get back on the road and play some poker!]]>
“Yeah right. You don’t play poker no more man, you’re a businessman now.” I had no reply because it truly has been a long time since I’ve played any live poker. After lunch the crew and I headed over to my place to do the key interview for the piece that is scheduled to air sometime in April. The interview went extremely well I think, not too many poker questions, but more stuff about my personal life, etc. Once the interview was done the camera guy got some shots of me playing poker online over at www.pokermountain.com. I typed into the chat box letting everyone know that it was being filmed and ended the sentence with “Smile, you’re on TV.” Once the crew was done with me I actually decided to head over to the Bellagio and put in a session. Of course… no game! Unreal, the one day I actually decide to play some poker there’s no game. The last time I went in to play the game was full at 5:30 in the afternoon. Oh well, I took care of some things while there and then head home to tackle a few important e-mails and phone calls. *************************************************************** February 13th I knew today was going to be a hectic day. I was filming 15 short segments for The Score in Toronto while the W-5 crew also needed to get some more things done with me. They planned on interviewing my mother early in the morning but my mother called me at about 8:00am to let me know she wasn’t feeling well at all. Overnight she lost some water weight and that often knocks her out the next day. The W-5 crew were very understanding and head over to Erick’s house with me. Why Erick’s house? Well E-DOG has a pimpin’ bachelor pad as I may have mentioned earlier and I thought it was the perfect place to shoot the poker tips that will air on The Score. E-DOG’s got it all, seven plasma screens, a projector, computers everywhere, a pool table, basketball court and a sizeable swimming pool. It’s pimp, real pimp. I showed up at Erick’s at around 1:00pm (about an hour late) and we got to shooting. Since I’d be doing 15 one and a half minute tips I knew I’d be there for several hours. Overall I think I did a decent job with the tips and it was back to my other camera crew with the W-5. Once finished with The Score tips E-DOG and I head over to PT’s PUB to get some shots of us hanging out playing some pool. They got what they needed and after they left Erick and I hung out for a while and talked “business”. After about an hour there though the vibe seemed a little dull so we head over to another hangout of ours, Road Runners. Erick’s buddy Ryan and my friend from Toronto Tyson joined us there. We hung out there for hours and when it was time to leave I didn’t think I should be driving. I stuck to beer most of the night but near the end we had a few Belvedere and Cranberrys. Couple the drinks with the fact that I was already exhausted and I decided to take a “little” nap in my car till I sobered up a bit. I planned on maybe dozing off for about an hour or so, but when I finally woke up I noticed it was 9:30am! Yikes, that was a full night’s sleep but I can’t say it was all that comfortable. *************************************************************** February 14th I made it home by about 10:00am and passed out on the couch. The W-5 crew made arrangements to do an interview with my mother and at about 10:30am I was awaken with a camera in my face! I covered my head with the blanket and let them go about their business. Basically they were getting a shot of my mother putting food in my fridge. At noon, my new assistant showed up for his first day at work. I gave him a list of chores to do and told him I’d be upstairs in bed. The doorbell rang at around 2:00pm with some good news… my Golden Tee 2005 had arrived! Well that woke me up for good as I was super excited to play. The W-5 crew’s timing was impeccable as they showed up at the house just as the game had been delivered. In fact, Victor the reporter on the story helped me to get the game to work, the guys who dropped it off didn’t have a clue how to work it and of course, neither did I. In order to make room for the game I had to move my little fridge out of the way so I decided to do that on my own. Big mistake. I pulled a muscle in my back and I’m in some pretty serious pain right now. I should know better than to try anything that requires exerting myself! Anne, the producer of the W-5 bit is also a Yoga fanatic so she showed me some exercises to help ease the pain. They worked- for a minute, but after that the pain just came right back. The crew took some more shots of the house, some of my trophies, bracelets, pictures, my massage chair, and of course my new toy the Golden Tee. It was about 4:00pm which meant quitting time for my assistant Travis. He was here for four hours and got a ton of work done, looks like this may work out very well for me. He had one last chore to do before he left though, get a butt kicking from me at Golden Tee! We played through 18 holes and he ended us shooting a +7, while I had a decent game and shot 6 under par. So with a little time to kill I head to the dry cleaners, picked up some mail at my PO BOX, deposited that check from Tunica and have a few minutes to make a journal entry. I wish I could say that I’m going to get some rest tonight, but at 6:30pm I have to meet the W-5 crew for some late night driving shots followed by a house game over at E-DOG’s place. I’m really trying to do more media related things this year, but man it is extremely tiring. I haven’t had a day of “nothing” in quite a while and it looks like my schedule is only going to get worse from here. If I’m not careful, I will seriously lose my mind! I need a day of nothingness bad… real bad.]]>
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RULES FOR MILLE:
The game is played with two decks, and each player (it’s a two player game) gets 15 cards and the game is played to 1200. The idea is to get all of your cards out before the other guy, scoring points along the way. The only way to get your cards down is to have at least three of a kind, or a pair and a wild card (the 2). Each card is given a different point value:
A 2 is worth 20
3-9 is worth 5
10,J,Q,K worth 10
A is worth 15
Queen of spades is worth 100
Jack of diamonds is worth 50
All the points you have down count for you, but what remains in your hand counts against you. When it’s your turn you can either take a fresh card from the deck, or take your opponents discard from the “pack”. In order to pick up the pack you must have at least a pair of what’s been thrown and then play it. You also MUST take all of the other cards in the pack.
There are special bonuses you can pick up along the way as well. One called a “chapeau” and the other called a “natural.” A Chapeau is scored when you go out of a hand while your opponent has a negative score for that particular hand. For example, if you had 60 points down but 75 points in your hand you’d be chapeaud for 15 points.
The other bonus is a natural. There are two types of naturals. The most common version would be to go out without using a 2 as a wildcard. Your points would be doubled and you’d also score a bonus which are called “marks.” The other natural comes when you get 8 of a kind. In that case you would double the points for the 8 of a kind and score a mark.
The betting works like this: let’s say you were playing $1-$3 and the final score looked like this:
340 160
700 320 (chapeau- usually marked by circling the number)
1040 (natural- marked this way *) 500
1230 585
This would be a massacre and would be scored like this:
$3 for winning the game
$3 for a chapeau
$3 for a natural
$3 for a skunk (if your opponent doesn’t get over the 600 point mark
$6 for each 100 points you win by called “ways”. It is rounded off, so a spead of 455 points would count as $5.
So in total you would win $18 for the game.]]>
“Yikes, ok we need to tone it down a little. Poker players aren’t up at this hour. The only time were ever up at this hour is when we’re STILL up from the night before!”
Once I got the cobwebs out I was able to do the interview. I never actually got out of bed to do the interview so when it was over I just rolled over and zonked right out.
I finally woke up at around 2:00pm to do yet another interview. I was done with that one by 2:15pm and did one last one at 2:30pm. I then checked my Treo 600 and saw that I had a doctor’s appointment across town in Henderson at 3:00pm.
Late in December when I was getting a massage during the Bellagio Five Star Classic the masseuse noticed a strange mole on my arm. She warned me that it might be cancerous and that I should get it checked out.
I had an appointment to get it checked out last month but blew it off. Then I got this phone call, “I’m pissed at you!.” It was Jennifer Harman on the phone.
“Why?”
“Don’t be such an idiot! This is no joke. You need to get that mole checked out, nothing is more important than that. I’m going to nag you everyday until you get that checked!.”
Ok, ok, so Jen was right. The doctor took a look at it and said that he “doubts” it’s cancerous but won’t be sure until he gets the lab results back in two weeks. In the meantime, he needed to “shave” it off. Shave it off? Yikes, that didn’t sound like fun!
It didn’t hurt a bit though, as he sliced the mole right off my arm and put it into a plastic container. “That’ll be $314 please.” Man, that’s one expensive mole!
On the way home I decided to do some window shopping and maybe pick up a few things if they caught my eye. I found an arcade warehouse on Russell Rd. and decided to stop in. My Golden Tee should be here on Tuesday and I planned on adding an NBA game as well. The salesman finally sold me on the NBA Showtime/NFL Blitz combo that will also arrive next week.
I wasn’t done there. My Lexus has a GPS built in but the truck I won at the WSOP this year doesn’t. It seems that every time I drive the Lexus to Los Angeles I get a flat tire, but I don’t know the city that well so I really need the GPS.
So I heard about a product called the Magellin. $1400 and it works all over the US apparently. When I get on a roll shopping I can really move. I hit Bed Bath and Beyond, Petsmart, Sprint, and Best Buy picking up something in each place.
I spent the rest of the night answering e-mails and writing my long overdue Card Player article about the Bellagio event. I genuinely feel bad for my editor Steve Radulovich. I haven’t got an article in on time since… yikes, I don’t even remember when! He has been great about it though, because if this were a “real job” I would have been fired months ago!
***************************************************************
Today I planned on getting some more errands done: buy a filing cabinet, a new telephone, head to the SSN office, pick up my mail at UPS, etc. Instead, I used the day to answer e-mails.
In brighter news, I think I may have found a PA. I’m meeting with a friend for dinner tonight who might work out to be perfect. Over the last few days I’ve received over 100 inquiries about the position and I guess I should have been more clear in stating that I need someone who already lives here in Las Vegas.
Why? I have my reasons and they make sense to me. I want someone who knows the city well and won’t be looking at this job as a reason to move. That’s too much of a burden on me and I think it will just be easier hiring someone who is already here.
This couldn’t come at a better time since my days will be full for the rest of the year. I just received my book offer and need to start writing immediately. I’m looking at three hours a day for at least three months. If I’m going to do this book right I need to write it myself. I could hire a ghostwriter but then it really wouldn’t be me writing the book and that’s important to me.
Time for me to hit the showers and get ready for dinner. After dinner E-DOG, myself, and the rest of the boys may head out to shoot some pool. I’ve gotta at least try to have some semblance of a social life!]]>
“Really, what was the problem with it?” I asked.
“Do you really wanna know?”
“Yeah, so that way if it ever happens again maybe I can fix it.”
“Are you sure?”
“Yeah!”
“Ok. You see this switch here that says Wireless on/off. I switched it to on.”
“LOL, LOL. I’m a complete idiot I love it.”
“I’m sorry, I felt really bad and didn’t want to tell you. I did clean up your hard drive and installed some spyware for you though.”
I wasn’t upset with him at all. I was just amazed at my own stupidity. I told him this isn’t the first time something like this has happened to me. A while back the lights in my backyard and my pool lights weren’t working and I couldn’t figure out why. So I called an electrician over to fix it (my father was an electrician).
The electrician goes into my bathroom, presses a button and voila, “That’ll be $45 please” LOL, as you can probably guess I’m not very handy around the house. My idea of fixing things around the house is dialing 1-800- HANDYMAN.
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Once my computer guy left I was on the phone making arrangements, talking business, and cleaning up a little. I was having tiles put in the bathrooms, kitchen, hallways, etc. for the last little while and now that they were done it was time to get the carpets cleaned.
Actually that’s not the real reason the carpets needed to be cleaned, Mushu has a habit of doing his business in random rooms in the house when it’s raining outside, but that’s another story.
I then head out to get my hair cut and then pick up a package at UPS. What was in the package? None of your business! I’ll tell you in about three months if it works 
***************************************************************
I spent the rest of the night hammering out some e-mails and looking at resumes! I made a mention in my last journal entry about my PA not being available and a day later I received a ton of e-mails inquiring about the position. So much so that I think I’m actually going to conduct interviews in mid-February when I get back from LA. First Kraft Foods and now conducting interviews. If I’m not careful here I’m going to become a grown up soon! Nah.
***************************************************************
Today I had a film crew from Toronto here doing a “day in the life of” story with me. If they want a realistic look at a typical day in my life that’s pretty easy:
“Hello, who’s this? Ok lemme call you back. Hello. Hey, how are you doing… blah blah blah” I spend most afternoons either on the phone or the computer these days.
The whole bit at my house consisted of me receiving a UPS package containing my new massage chair… and me opening it! Wooooow. Then at 3:00pm I did an interview for a new Korean magazine here in Las Vegas. They offered to give me a copy of the magazine when it’s out but I’m like… “It’s in Korean? I know Kimchi, I know Pe goo pa, and I definitely know ma shee le and mo goo le, but dude I can’t read Korean!”
While I was in the shower they were interviewing my mother. Man, put a camera in my mother’s face and the over/under on when she starts to cry is 43 seconds! “I’m so proud of him. Boo hoo hoo.” She is a very passionate and emotional woman obviously.
Watching Animal Planet is like torture. She sees a skinny puppy or a kitten with no mother and it’s time to open up the flood gates! Ok, I know I’m crackin’ on my own mother here but I’m allowed… she’s MY mother and off limits to you all when it comes to crackin’ jokes. Kind of like how it’s not cool for a white guy to use the N word- you get my drift.
When I got out of the shower it was time for the “goodbye” scene with my mother. Funny thing about reality tv, “Ok that was great, but can we shoot that one more time for safety guys.”
“Huh? The first goodbye wasn’t real enough? Ok, I’ll nail it this time, focus Daniel focus. You can do this.”
Having become pretty familiar with cameras being around it’s given me a lot more insight into so called, “reality tv.” This crew was from Ontario Sports Net mind you and didn’t claim to be filming reality tv, but still I thought that was funny.
I mean, my mother is waiting at the door going, “Daniel, ok come to the door they said we have to say goodbye in 30 seconds. Are you ready?” Gotta love Mommy, she’s becoming quite the actress.
***************************************************************
The crew followed me down to the Palms for the last part of the shoot. An interview with their host, where I teach him a little about poker and basically do your typical interview. Only this time in a live poker room with cash games all around me.
That went well and on the way home I called Jenn, Marco, and E-DOG so we all met over at the Cheesecake factory. I was only two minutes from there when I called everybody so I knew I might be sitting alone for a while.
I made sure to tell the waitress, “It’s a table for four and the others are coming I promise.” About five more minutes went bye and again I said, ‘Sorry for tying up your table, but I promise we’ll take good care of you.”
She came by again 10 minutes later and it was Jenn on the phone. I was pointing to the phone like, “That’s them, I really do have friends I promise. I’m really not crazy, they will be here.”
The waitress was very sweet about it and didn’t seem bothered at all. I felt like a complete dork but whatever. They finally showed up and I told the waitress again,
Ok, so as soon as I get off the plane in Tunica I pick up a cold. I get here and as usual have a difficult time finding food that works for me. The tournament starts and I see that the structure is simply terrible. I looked at it this way: A) I can sulk, continue to whine like a baby about things or, B) try to make the best of the situation. If I chose A), I would have probably been on a flight home on day one. By choosing B) I find myself at the final table once again. I went through spurts of course whining,
“Who me? I’m 18.”
“And you over there, how old are you?”
“I’m 18 too.”
What in the world is going on here??? I just turned 30 and now I’m the old fart at the table? I was thinking they should change the title of the Maxim peace to “aging veterans.”
Since the legal gambling age in Bahamas is 18 there was a large contingent of “under aged” online qualifiers.
I also did another more in depth interview with a guy named Pat Jordan. I’ll tell you what, I could have interviewed him and I think it would have made for a much better story! Very interesting guy and obviously a pro at what he does. Although he still uses an old rickety type writer and isn’t online yet. Talk about old school!
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The island was great and I’ll be sharing some pictures from my trip pretty soon. I had an old, almost high school buddy there from Toronto as well as my fianc