Understanding Complimentary Drinks In Casinos - Front Desk Tip

The catalyst I'm most excited for is the day when you can order oils, edibles and infused drinks from restaurants and the room service menu in your Las Vegas Hotel. We will see custom strains and products developed for each restaurant casino and hotel.
Although recreational cannabis use is legal in Nevada and has been since 2017, public consumption is not, and this includes at most hotel and casino properties. The safe banking act will get us one step closer but federal legalization will be required to allow casino hotels to allow this to happen.
Federal legalization will have a huge impacts on states that already allow recreational MJ products. Established producers will have a head start on getting partnerships with these large companies. Once a power house like MGM can be invested into its own supply chain of these products it will be rocket ships for all.
Covid will fade away and travel will return.
Biden/Harris will get the safe act through and follow Canada in full federal legislation.
My bet is on AMA, aka https://www.1933industries.com/ It has been a horrible performer and is currently beat down to all time lows. I predict they will be one of the biggest turn around good news stories over the next 3 months.

https://www.zippia.com/advice/largest-companies-in-nevada/

Las Vegas MGM properties:

• Bellagio) (owned by The Blackstone Group and leased by MGM Resorts International)
• CityCenter (50% joint venture with Dubai World)
  • Aria Resort & Casino
  • Vdara
• Excalibur
• Luxor
• Mandalay Bay
  • Delano Las Vegas
  • Mandalay Bay Convention Center
  • Mandalay Bay Events Center
• MGM Grand Las Vegas
  • MGM Grand Garden Arena
  • Skylofts at MGM Grand
  • The Mansion at MGM Grand
  • The Signature at MGM Grand (50% joint venture with Turnberry Associates)[185]
• The Mirage
• New York-New York
• Park MGM
• T-Mobile Arena (42.5% ownership stake)

Part 3 in the COVID series.
To try and make this list more helpful, I have added Weekend Day and Weekend Night, as those can be vastly different than during the week.
I'm trying to monitor Twitter and the Vegas Message Board to get some additional information.
Keep sharing all that wonderful goodness.
I'd like to update the wiki to talk about what sidebets casinos have, so if you know that info, I can add it to the table comments.

Vegas Strip Casino	Day Min	Night Min	Weekend Day	Weekend Night	Dividers	Comments
Aria	10	10	Unknown	Unknown	No	Updated 7/26
Ballys	10	15	10	Unknown		3 tables Updated 8/8
Bellagio	10	25	Unknown	Unknown	Yes, all tables
Caesars	15	25	Unknown	Unknown	No
Cosmo	15-25	50-100	Unknown	Unknown
Encore	10	10	10	10	Yes, on some tables	Updated 8/12
Excalibur	10-15	15	10	15		Updated 8/12
Flamingo	15	15-25	Unknown	25		Updated 8/8
Harrah's	15	25	25	25	No
Linq	15	15	Unknown	25	No	Updated 8/8
Luxor	10	10	15	15n		Updated 8/12
Mandalay Bay	15	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown
MGM Grand	10	25	Unknown	Unknown	Yes
NY/NY	10	15-25	15	Unknown	Yes	Updated 8/8
Osheas	Unknown	15	Unknown	Unknown
Paris	15	15	Unknown	Unknown	No	Updated 8/8
Sahara	5	10	10	10		Updated 8/15
Strat	Day	10	Unknown	10	25	No
Treasure Island	5	15	Unknown	Unknown
Venetian	10-15	25	Unknown	Unknown	No
Wynn	10	10	10	10	Yes, on some tables	Updated 8/12

Downtown Casino	Day Min	Night Min	Weekend Day	Weekend Night	Dividers	Comments
Binions	5	10	Unknown	Unknown		Binions had $5 table several times (opens at noon) Updated 8/17
California	10	10	Unknown	Unknown		Tables open at 11AM Updated 8/10
The D	10	15	Unknown	Unknown	No glass
Downtown Grand	10	10	Unknown	Unknown		Table opens at noon. Updated 8/10.
El Cortez	10	10	10	10	Yes, some tables	2 tables Updated 8/15
Four Queens	10	10	10	10	No	Updated 8/15
Fremont	10	10	10	Unknown		Updated 8/10.
Golden Gate	10	15	Unknown	Unknown		Updated 8/18
Golden Nugget	10-15	10	Unknown	Unknown		$15 with one table open on 8/18
Plaza	10	10	Unknown	Unknown		Updated 7/30
Sams Town	15	15	Unknown	Unknown		1 table

Offstrip Casino	Day Min	Night Min	Weekend Day	Weekend Night	Dividers	Comments
Aliente	10	10	Unknown	Unknown
Boulder Station	10	10	Unknown	Unknown
Cannery	5	5	Unknown	Unknown		up to 2 tables - now allowing 4 per side
Ellis Island	5	5	5	5		1 table - Updated 8/17 - I just called the pit at Ellis. Craps table opens up at 10am and its 5 dollars 90% of the time
Gold Coast	10	10	Unknown	Unknown
Green Valley Ranch	10	10	Unknown	Unknown		2 tables open
The Orleans	10	25	Unknown	Unknown		up to 4 tables, I was asked to wear a mask
Palace Station	10	10	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown
Palms	N/A	N/A	Unknown	Unknown		No open date announced
Red Rock	10	15	15	Unknown		Updated 8/14
South Point	5	5	5	10	No	Updated 8/15
Strat	5	10	Unknown	Unknown
Sunset Station	5	5	Unknown	Unknown

Other NV Casinos	Day Min	Night Min	Weekend Day	Weekend Night	Dividers	Comments
Edgewater (Laughlin)	10	10	Unknown	Unknown
Harrahs (Laughlin)	10	15	Unknown	Unknown	no
Atlantis (Reno)	5/10	5/10	Unknown	Unknown		3 tables on weekends
Cal Neva (Reno)	5	5	Unknown	Unknown
Circus Circus (Reno)	Closed	Closed	Unknown	Unknown		Closed table game pit
Eldorado (Reno)	5	10	Unknown	Unknown
Grand Sierra (Reno)	15	15-25 Unknown	Unknown
Peppermill (Reno)	5	5	10	10	3 craps tables
Silver Legacy (Reno)	10	10	Unknown	Unknown
Hard Rock (Tahoe)	5	5	Unknown	Unknown
Harrahs (Tahoe)	10	10	Unknown	Unknown
Montbleu (Tahoe)	10	15	Unknown	Unknown
Nugget (Wendover)	5	5	5	5		Updated 7/31
Peppermill (Wendover)	5	5	10	10		Updated 7/31
Rainbow (Wendover)	5	5	10	10		Updated 7/31

Non/NV Casino	Day Min	Night Min	Weekend Day	Weekend Night	Dividers	Comments
Wind Creek (Wetumpka, AL)	15	25	Unknown	Unknown		4 to a table Updated 7/31
Sycuan (San Diego, CA)	10	10	Unknown	Unknown		Masks required
Barona (So Cal)	10	15	10	10-15		2 tables 2 per side, dealers managing bets for players. Updated 8/21 ($10 at times)
Harrahs (So Cal)	15-25	15-25	15-50	15-50	No	Updated 7/31
Viejas (So Cal)	N/A	N/A	Unknown	Unknown		No live tables
Foxwoods (CT)	15	25	Unknown	Unknown
Mohegan (CT)	15-25	25	Unknown	Unknown		2 were 10, 2
Harrington (DE)	15	15-25	Unknown	Unknown		Must wear mask and face shield
Rivers (Chicago, IL)	15	15
Blue Chip (Michigan City, IN)	5	10	Unknown	Unknown		5 minimum prop bets, 5 min ATS bet.
Caesars Southern IN	10	15	15	25		Updated 8/5
French Lick Resort (French Lick, IN)	15	15	25	25		Tables open at 11am and close at 3AM. Updated 8/5
Harrah's Hooiser Park (Anderson, IN)	10	10	Unknown	Unknown
Indiana Grand (IN)	10	15	Unknown	Unknown	No
Belle (Baton Rogue, LA)	5	10	Unknown	Unknown		one half sized table sometimes they open the big one. $5 small table and $10 big late at night
Hollywood (Baton Rogue, LA)	5	10	Unknown	15		Updated 7/24
L’auberge (Baton Rogue,LA)	15	15	Unknown	Unknown	No
L’auberge (Lake Charles,LA)	15	15	Unknown	Unknown	No	1 bubble craps $5 min
El Dorado (Shreveport, LA)	10	10	10	10		Updated 8/17
Horseshoe (Shreveport, LA) 15	15	15	15		Updated 8/17
Margaritaville (Shreveport, LA) 15	15	15	15		Updated 8/17
Ocean Downs (MD)	10	15		Unknown	Unknown
Maryland Live (MD)	25	50	50	Unknown	Yes	5 tables, 4 per side. Electronic craps 15 min
MGM @ National Harbor	50-100		Unknown	Unknown	Yes	4 craps tables 2 were $50 and 2 were $100 mins. Not bubble craps or low roller options.
Firekeepers (Battle Creek, MI)	10	15+	Unknown	Unknown	No dividers, only distancing	1-2 tables depending on demand, did see it at $15 during the day $25 on Fri/Sat night. Masks required, no smoking. $3 Bubble Craps.
Four Winds Casino	15	15	Unknown	Unknown		Digital craps table 5$ min Tuesday and Sunday night. Did not check bubble craps
Gun Lake (Wayland, MI)	10	15	Unknown	Unknown	No	Temp check, masks, usually the crapless table is open
Turtle Creek (Traverse City, MI)	5	Unknown	Unknown	Unknowned		2 tables, temp check, masks
Soaring Eagle (Mt Pleasant, MI)	10	15	Unknown	Unknown	Yes	5 players per side with glass. Tough to hear dealer.
Hollywood Casino, Maryland Heights (St Louis) MO	15	15	Unknown	Unknown		1 regular table & 1 no craps. 4 per side. No outside drinks.
River City (St. Louis, MS)	20	20	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	4 players per side. $20 min. You have to have at least a $20 bet for every throw to "hold your spot"
Beau Rivage (Biloxi, MS)	25	25	Unknown	Unknown	unknown	3 tables
Boomtown (Biloxi, MS)	10	10	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	1 table
IP (Biloxi, MS)	25	25	Unknown	Unknown
Scarlett Pearl (Biloxi, MS)	15	25	Unknown	Unknown	No	Masks required, temp check
The Palace Biloxi, MS)	10	15	Unknown	Unknown
Treasure Bay (Biloxi, MS)	10	10	Unknown	Unknown
Harrah’s Cherokee & Murphy	15	15	Unknown	Unknown	No
Harrahs River Valley (Murphy, NC)	25	25	Unknown	Unknown
Ballys (AC, NJ)	15	15	Unknown	10		Updated 7/29
Caesars (AC, NJ)	15	15	Unknown	15-25		Updated 7/29
Harrahs (AC, NJ)	15	15	Unknown	Unknown
Hard Rock (AC, NJ	15	25	Unknown	Unknown		2 tables - Updated 7-29
Resorts (AC, NJ)	15	25	Unknown	15	Yes	1 table - Updated 7-29
Ocean (AC, NJ)	10	15	15	25	Yes	4-6 tables
Buffalo Creek (NY)	15	25	Unknown	Unknown
Seneca Niagra (NY)	10	15	Unknown	Unknown		1 table, can go up to $25
Jack/Harrah's (Cincinnati, OH)	25	25	25	25		3 tables, $25 open to close
Hollywood (Columbus, OH)	10-15	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	2 tables, masks required
Hollywood (Grantville, PA)	15	25	Unknown Unknown	Unknown		2 tables, masks required
Harrah's Philly (PA)	Unknown	Unknown	15	25		Updated 8/10
Meadows (PA)	10	10	Unknown	Unknown		2-3 tables.
Mohegan Sun (PA)	Unknown	Unknown	25-50	Unknown
Windcreek (PA)	10	10	Unknown	Unknown
Mount airy (PA)	10	10	Unknown	Unknown
Valley Forge (PA)			10
Parx (Bensalem, PA)	15	25	Unknown	Unknown		15 but maintaining 25
Southland Casino Racing (West Memphis, TN)	N/A	N/A	Unknown	Unknown	Yes	4 tables all closed. Other pit games open with plexiglas dividers. Bubble craps $5 minimum.
Mardi Gras (Nitro, WV)			15			Usually open on weekends - Updated 7/28

*Last update 8/21
Part 1. It's getting buried so I figured we would make a new one. Part 2
Pulled additional info from here.

The previous post is here. It's getting buried so I figured we would make a new one.
Keep reporting those minimums:

Vegas Strip Casino	Day Min	Night Min	Dividers	Comments
Aria	10	10	Yes
Ballys
Bellagio	10	25	Yes, all tables	)May be lower on weekday nights, $15 has been seen) Poker tables open
Caesars	15	25	No	Poker tables open
Casino Royale	N/A	N/A	N/A	Table Games not open
Cosmo	15/25	50-100
Encore	50	100	Yes, on some tables	Reports of $10 tables during the day
Excalibur	10-15	15		10 crapless, 15 regular
Flamingo	10-15	15-25
Harrah's	15	25	No
Linq	10-15	10-15	No
Luxor	10	10
Mandalay Bay	N/A	N/A
MGM Grand	10	25	Yes, all tables
NY/NY	10	15-25	Yes, all tables
Osheas	Unknown	15
Paris	10-15	15	No	Opened 6/18 - Masks required at tables.
Planet Hollywood	N/A	N/A		No open date announced
Rio	N/A	N/A		No open date announced
Sahara	5	10
Strat	Day	10	Unknown
Treasure Island	5	15
Venetian	10-15	25	No
Wynn	25-50	50-100	Yes, on some tables	Updated 6/16

Downtown Casino	Day Min	Night Min	Dividers	Comments
Binions	5	10		Binions had $5 table several times with little to no social distancing
California	10	10		From 7/15 on Vegas Message Board
The D	10	15	No glass
Downtown Grand	10	10		Checks your temperature before letting you into casino, also NO valet, self-park only.
El Cortez	10	10	Yes, some tables	2 tables
Four Queens	10	10	No	From 7/16 on Vegas Message Board, Four queens had a $5 table in the morning on saturday
Fremont	10	10		From 7/15 on Vegas Message Board
Golden Gate	10	15		From 7/14 on Vegas Message Board
Golden Nugget	10	10		From 7/15 on Vegas Message Board
Plaza	10	10
Sams Town	15	15		1 table

Offstrip Casino	Day Min	Night Min	Dividers	Comments
Aliente	10	10
Boulder Station	10	10
Cannery	5	5		up to 2 tables - now allowing 4 per side
Ellis Island	5	5		1 table
Gold Coast	10	10
Green Valley Ranch	10	10		2 tables open
The Orleans	10	25		up to 4 tables, I was asked to wear a mask
Palace Station	10	10	Unknown
Palms	N/A	N/A		No open date announced
Red Rock	10	15
South Point	5	5		2-3x tables w/ only one $5 buy in
Strat	5	10
Sunset Station	5	5

Other NV Casinos	Day Min	Night Min	Dividers	Comments
Edgewater (Laughlin)	10	10
Harrahs (Laughlin)	10	15	no
Atlantis (Reno)	5/10	5/10		3 tables on weekends
Cal Neva (Reno)	5	5
Circus Circus (Reno)	Closed	Closed		Closed table game pit
Eldorado (Reno)	5	10
Grand Sierra (Reno)	15	15-25
Peppermill (Reno)	10	10	3 craps tables
Silver Legacy (Reno)	10	10
Hard Rock (Tahoe)	5	5
Harrahs (Tahoe)	10	10
Montbleu (Tahoe)	10	15

Non/NV Casino	Day Min	Night Min	Dividers	Comments
Foxwoods (CT)	15	25
Mohegan (CT)	10-50	10-50		2 were 10, 2 $15, 1 $25, 1 $50. Plus a high rollers table
Harrington (DE)	15	15-25		Must wear mask and face shield
Blue Chip (Michigan City, IN)	5	10		5 minimum prop bets, 5 min ATS bet.
Harrah's Hooiser Park (Anderson, IN)	10	10
Indiana Grand (IN)	10	15	No
Belle (Baton Rogue, LA)	5	10		one half sized table sometimes they open the big one. $5 small table and $10 big late at night
Hollywood (Baton Rogue, LA)	5	10		one half sized table sometimes they open the big one. $5 small table and $10 big late at night
L’auberge (Baton Rogue,LA)	15	15	No
L’auberge (Lake Charles,LA)	15	15	No	1 bubble craps $5 min
Harrahs (Shreveport, LA)	15	25
Margaritaville (Shreveport, LA)	25	25
Ocean Downs (MD)	10	15
Maryland Live (MD)	25	50	Yes	5 tables, 4 per side. Electronic craps 15 min
MGM @ National Harbor	50-100		Yes	4 craps tables 2 were $50 and 2 were $100 mins. Not bubble craps or low roller options.
Firekeepers (Battle Creek, MI)	10	15+	No dividers, only distancing	1-2 tables depending on demand, did see it at $15 during the day $25 on Fri/Sat night. Masks required, no smoking. $3 Bubble Craps.
Four Winds Casino	15	15		Digital craps table 5$ min Tuesday and Sunday night. Did not check bubble craps
Gun Lake (Wayland, MI)	10	15	No	Temp check, masks, usually the crapless table is open
Turtle Creek (Traverse City, MI)	5
Soaring Eagle (Mt Pleasant, MI)	10	15	Yes	5 players per side with glass. Tough to hear dealer.
Hollywood Casino, Maryland Heights (St Louis) MO	15	15		1 regular table & 1 no craps. 4 per side. No outside drinks.
River City (St. Louis, MS)	20	20	Unknown	4 players per side. $20 min. You have to have at least a $20 bet for every throw to "hold your spot"
Beau Rivage (Biloxi, MS)	25	25	unknown	3 tables
Boomtown (Biloxi, MS)	10	10	Unknown	1 table
IP (Biloxi, MS)	25	25
Scarlett Pearl (Biloxi, MS)	15	25	No	Masks required, temp check
The Palace Biloxi, MS)	10	15
Treasure Bay (Biloxi, MS)	10	10
Harrah’s Cherokee & Murphy	15	15	No
Harrahs River Valley (Murphy, NC)	25	25
Harrahs (AC, NJ)	15	15
Hard Rock (AC, NJ	25	25	Yes	2 tables
Resorts (AC, NJ)	15	25	Yes	1 table
Ocean (AC, NJ)	15	25	Yes	4-6 tables
Buffalo Creek (NY)	15	25
Seneca Niagra (NY)	10	15		1 table, can go up to $25
Hollywood (Columbus, OH)	10-15	Unknown	Unknown	2 tables, masks required
Hollywood (Grantville, PA)	15	25	Unknown	2 tables, masks required
Meadows (PA)	10	10		2-3 tables.
Windcreek (PA)	10	10
Mount airy (PA)	10	10
Parx (Bensalem, PA)	15	25		15 but maintaining 25
Sycuan (San Diego, CA)	10	10		Masks required
Barona (So Cal)	5	5		3 tables, dealers managing bets for players.
Harrahs (So Cal)	15-25	15-25		Bubble craps $5 min, Interblock bubble $3 min, 1 electronic table $5 min
Viejas (So Cal)	N/A	15		1 table
Southland Casino Racing (West Memphis, TN)	N/A	N/A	Yes	4 tables all closed. Other pit games open with plexiglas dividers. Bubble craps $5 minimum.

Last update 7/21
Pulled additional info from here.

Part 8 (has access to parts 1-7 in it)
For some reason it would not post the last day or so.
It is early 2017. I have been carrying on my usual playing 10-20 hours a week to survive. Still lethargic is best term I suppose. I just dont get excited to play anymore. I consider getting a job to remind me how shitty working is so it gives me a kick in the teeth to play poker. Then it dawns on me, I hate playing poker now.
Poker has been tainted. Everything bad that happened to me I can associate with poker. The rise and fall was poker (the fall part). The oxycontin started as a performance enhancer to log more hours. Everything I consider to be wrong in my life I trace back to poker essentially, even if just a butterfly affect reason that had I done something else I wouldnt be here.
Hating poker is not the greatest realization considering its my only means to income outside of grunt labor. I seek a job in a couple places to no avail which was fine, I didnt wanna do that either.
Several months earlier I had started playing on SWC (bitcoin site) and became familiarized with bitcoin. Thought nothing of it, it was just the currency I was winning or losing. I dont read a thing about it, I learn nothing of it. I wasnt playing a ton or even big stakes, my intention for playing online was to just stay sharp in case it ever comes back full fledge. I have 5-6 btc on this site at the most (2-3k) and I flush it playing plo and big o not thinking much of it.
Back to 2017. Its March/April~ of 2017. I am playing cards one night dicking around probably had a couple drinks and was needling the usuals etc. A guy I do not know is in the game. Looks Russian. I bet he interfered in our election... fucking commies. I dont remember how I got to talking to him but crypto had been brought up. I talk about SWC. Tell him I had a few btc but not anymore. The only other thing I remember well from the conversation was bitching about going from an iphone4 (yes I had an iphone4 from 2010-17, the same one. It barely worked. Many oxycontins snorted off the back of that phone, texts dating back to when I got it in 2010) to the 6 or 7 or wtfever I have now, which is bigger and its harder to text and drive. He just responds by saying “first world problems are the worst”. Amen brother, those Africans and Venezuelans have no clue of our struggle.
I end up talking to him a bit and it turns out he mines crypto. Has a website that sells mining equipment. He has a hell of a back story too. I tell him I am interested in mining. I have about 20k to my name at this time and I realized recently that I dont like playing poker so why not? He eventually tells me not to do it. Regardless we become friends and he is ultimately the most important friend I have ever made. I have made more positive strides mentally since meeting him (mostly work ethic, realizations, reality checks and aspirations) As silly as it sounds, when he told me “first world problems are the worst” it stuck with me. He was saying it as a joke but jokes are funniest when true. He is genuinely the smartest guy I have ever associated with also. If you run into him at a poker table youd think he was a high functioning autist. Then you talk to him and go “ohhh hes just one of those Einstein type geniuses”. His hair is usually a mess, he cuts his own hair for or has his girlfriend do it. He wears cheap clothing usually since it all covers your ass or nipples I suppose. He virtually never instigates conversation with people he doesnt know. He is really deliberate with his actions. Talks really calmly and knows exactly what he is saying. He is just on the same level at all times it seems.
Meeting him has definitely changed my life for the better. We become friends pretty quickly. I know I went on a downer after meeting him because I couldnt afford to buy mining stuff and remember wanting to (again, he told me not to do it eventually anyways).
Which will lead me to another good friend to have. Between 2015 and this point in 2017 I have shot myself in the foot not logging hours a couple times. A friend has bailed me out with a loan or short term stake a few times. He is a well off restaurant owner who loves poker more than just about anything not related to him. Every time I see him we talk about hands he played and he just eats it up, has photographic memory and never butchers a hand history which is nice. He is as good hearted of a guy as I have ever met. (Sorry if this is getting long winded giving praise to people close to me, I intend on sharing with a few people and would like them to know what they mean to me as corny as that is because I suck at doing it in real life. Plus it is kinda gay to get mushy sounding in real life, but I digress. Theyve heard virtually none of the content of this whole thread either, a ton of this stuff I have never shared) In fact he is too kind hearted. He has helped people who wouldnt piss on him if he was on fire, and people have burned him on many occasions. My only complaint about this person is he never kicked my ass and told me to log more hours or fuck off. I needed it. If I just logged hours I wouldnt need the help. Its as simple as that. I have no leaks other than the unwillingness to play (leaks as in drugs/pit games/strippers/wtf ever else) and it has hindered me immensely over the these last couple years. (Ok I do have one embarrassing leak that has been fixed for a year and change, mobile games... I have spent like 30,000$ on mobile games between late 2016 and late 2018, Lords Mobile specifically clocked me for 20k. This definitely hindered my ability to build a roll and got me into a few jams. When youre not logging hours playing youre sitting around gaming and these games arent cheap obviously)
It is around May now and my friend who messes with crypto tells me that Bitcoin is going to 10,000$. Its like 800$ at the time iirc. I own a couple from Ignition cashouts. I kind of trust him. I cant argue him on it as I have literally no mental fortitude on the subject, but I essentially shrug it off. I start watching the price on poloniex and am watching prices jump like crazy. Light bulb in head! I can buy the dips sell the peaks and have more BTC! Lets load the 2.5btc I have onto poloniex! Sell peak but it keeps climbing... “FUCK! gotta get it back before it goes to 10k! Whew. Still have 2.45 BTC. FUCK! Its dropping! Get it out before it goes to zero!”
Yea I turned that 2.5 BTC into .4 BTC. No joke. I think I ended up throwing it onto SWC and losing it once it was almost gone. I honestly forget. I had nothing when it finally hit 20k other than some shit alts worth about 800$ at most (worth 35$ now but they still reside in my locked poloniex account, maybe I will give poloniex my ID if they ever become worth more than 1k)
So I am now annoyed I didnt turn every free dollar I had into BTC. I didnt trust the guy enough and to be fair I would have been using the money I play with. Had I met the guy a year earlier (know what I know of him now) I would probably have just locked it all up and sat around waiting.
I never really get my act together in 2017. I continuously log just enough hours to get by. I just dont care. I just want a way out of this. I catch myself saying “I hate playing poker” and sometime around the end of 17 or early 2018 I start trying to censor myself and quit saying that. Saying it will only make it fester deeper. I have to retrain myself to love poker. I remember the days of playing 18-24 hours straight because I love playing. I love watching for everything I can find to get an edge. I love a situation to present itself where I can step out of line. But now I just sit down and count the minutes before I can tell myself “way to go! You put in an 8 hour shift lets pack it in!” I leave good games often times. I celebrate when games break. This is where I am mentally while I play. I cant break out of it.
Late in 2017 a close friend of mine passes away. Will call him J. He was the guy who gave me a place to stay after the shutdown in Joplin. I was still doing oxy and he never once touched the stuff knowing what has happened to me. He doesnt judge me, he is somewhat of an enabler I suppose. He just drinks does shitty coke sometimes and has a script of adderol and xanax. Literally never once does he do any with me (ive warned him xanax and opiates will kill you if you mix, which is likely part of the reason he never did it) He was a marginal poker player (relative to modern game, he was just good enough to beat the rake live but he had too many pit leaks) and took great pride in being my friend (I was the slayer in the area for years leading up to this, anyone considered the best in their area can relate, you just have the respect of the local poker community). One of my earlier live poker memories involved him. I am like 18 or 19 playing a 1-2 game at a small casino and he was there with a friend. They were the good players in the game at the time. They were having a few drinks eating nice food and laughing having a good time. I remember thinking that I want this lifestyle. Care free gambling fast paced lifestyle. I had told him this story years later and he just ate it up, constantly tried to get me to rebound, but as I have stated many many times in the last few of these I have basically waved my white flag and accepted the result of my fall.
Anyhow after living with him we always talk every few months at minimal and have something to eat when we see each other at the casino. He was somewhat disingenuous sounding he was so nice and honestly it got to a point it started rubbing me the wrong way. I still talk to him of course but less frequently. In December of 2017 I get a phone call from my friend who owns the restaurant and he is distraught. He has been at the hospital and J has passed away. The back story on this is he had gotten a phone call from old friend who was getting out of prison in Arizona with no where to go (a female). J being as nice a guy as he is drives the 20+ hours to get her and gives her a place to stay. Well shes a junky and actually convinces J to do opiates/heroin. He overdoses and dies. I hadnt talked to him in a few months. I regret it. Had I known I would have beaten him senseless and got him to quit before things actually get bad.
Going to his funeral hit me up side the head too. The way I started feeling he was disingenuous just got destroyed. I cant fathom as many people showing up to my funeral with as nice of things to say. I wrote something to say but opt out after a few people say everything I had written (except better). I regret not saying them anyways. I think I still have what I wrote tucked away with the card and his money clip that made its way to me. I stumbled across his casino players card in a box one day and it resides in my wallet ever since. This was the first close friend that has passed away in my life, knock on wood. It woke me up a bit and caused a lot of self reflection because I felt I had let him down. I lived a few miles from him and didnt drop in to see him, didnt stay in contact as well as I should have. All because I felt he was disingenuously nice when he was actually just nice, which is actually because I am a cynical hermit who hates social life these days. That was the real reason I didnt stay closer. Him being too nice was just my excuse to blow him off essentially.
Only other thing I can add is that chick he helped out didnt even go to his funeral and on top of that had tried to take his truck and clean his house out. Junkies are the worst. I was a junky but I proudly say I never robbed anyone or cost anyone anything other than emotional distress, which isnt much of a brag obviously.
2018 starts and I have been decreasing my methadone every week for about 3-4 months now. I am on a low dose. Makes sleeping at night hard (get restless legs and sneezy). So I am having a few drinks any time I am at the casino playing (still just two days a week for the most part) to help get through those late night sessions when its worn off and I feel crummy. I get down to 15mg then 10mg and in March of 2018 I get asked if I wanna work for a week with my crypto friend. His friend is setting up a farm with 500 miners and needs help. I agree. The pay is in excess of the work (in my opinion) at 3k and I have no expenses, but I dont argue obviously. Before we leave town I have to pick up my week of methadone (at 4mg now) and so I do that. I never take any of them, I have the box still. Never opened it. They remain at my apartment as a reminder, the box carrying the 6 doses and a stack of receipts for every 75$ week that I kept in the box, several years worth, at least 9-10k worth of receipts, and that shits CHEAP compared to oxy. So I am finally off of opiates. I take kratom still but its essentially non addictive in comparison. Ill cede that I am reliant on kratom but if it disappeared tomorrow I wouldnt panic, I would be fine.
So I fly to Denver with my friend and meet his friends half brother who was instructed to rent a box truck and the three of us were to drive from Denver to Washington carrying like half a million dollars worth of hardware. Its early March, the roads arent exactly great. Half brother of his friend rents a truck with no middle seat though. Its absolutely miserable. Whoever sat middle was sitting like a fem boy legs closed and knees up high from the drive shaft hump. It was un fucking real how uncomfortable the middle was. So like I stated the roads were not great, we drove on ice for 5-6 hours straight (while my crypto friend did about 30 minutes of it before I decided I value my life and banned him from driving, he was literally doing over 70 on this ice sheet when I checked the gauge. I forget what he said, I will fail to make it sound as good but he said that he is protected and can not die, if we wreck he wont get hurt because of some universe stipulation that protects him. He said we would get hurt but he wouldnt. *** Ok here is what he said.
“quantum immortality. if i die in this universe, my conciousness will shift to others where i am still alive”
He just couldnt assure us ours would.
I end up driving like 18 of the 24 (one shot) hours it took as letting crypto friend drive was out. We make it set up a farm over a couple days then we go to Vegas. Not only do we go to Vegas but we fly a private jet. Not only do we take a private jet but his buddy has all four of us our own room at the Bellagio for 5-6 days. I remember having a 4500$ win at Bellagios 500$ cap 2-5 game... ran pretty salty. I only remember one hand worth bringing up, but I closed action and called 400$ pre with 67o with 3 others all in. Just flop 77X and send me the money. (Was drinking, gamble gamble). I cold called that also, some fish had opened massive and a 300$ stack just ripped a 400$ stack rejammed and I had called out of bb knowing fish will call off his 400~. This is actually a leak I have in poker. I will go over it because it has history.
Dating back to online my biggest leak was playing vs short stacks. Everyones biggest leak obv (6m setting). There were a few min buyers on Carbon and I got to the point I put them in pre every time they opened my bb from button, so long as they opened 75%+ from button or close to it. This has carried with me live, if I can gamble 3-4 ways (4 specifically) I will basically do it any time its 100bb~ or less with about 40% of hands if I can close action safely. I am a bit of a degenerate in this sense. I will flip for 1k if I have 10k to my name. It mostly came as a way to loosen up tables (the flipping blind preflop) at my local casino with players who give action. I am pretty snug in general but I cant refuse a flip when it presents itself and I cant refuse a fun gamble with short stacks.
I spend the month in Vegas during WSOP and run absurdly bad. Lose every big pot I play it seems. Switch to PLO the last half of the month and go a week straight without tripling my buy in up at any point. Just insane. Looking back I play rather poorly in PLO. I have been spoiled with my PLO games back home (which have been dead for about a year) and could get away with playing 50% of hands and no one ever bet big draws or anything not the nuts basically. I didnt adjust at all is what the issue was. Was just a frustrating month.
So I return and take a stake from a friend. I barely play still. Same ole same ole.
The last thing I will cover for this section is an incident late in 2018. One of the girls who is the floor at my local casino takes kratom also, we talk about it a fair amount. She has some 10mg percocets (mini oxycontins essentially) she gives me two of them. I havent had one in several years. I have been off methadone for 6-8 months at the time. I am eager to feel what I felt all those years ago, having no tolerance. So I take them home even though I know I shouldnt.
I get home and take both of them. What transpires is almost depressing. It frustrates me to no end that I realized that I have no desire for these. It affirms that all the money I flushed wasnt about the high, it was about the not withdrawing. I basically stated this in an earlier post but this is the event that I learned this from. I dont even enjoy it. I just sink knowing that I gave my life away for these. I have never recovered thanks to pain killers. Never once after 2011 have I ever looked in the mirror and said “finally, I have finally recovered what I fucked off”.
I am going to finish this thread off on the next post most likely. It will likely be long and take me a while to compose as it will cover my current year, and put a bow on it. The story basically climaxes a couple posts back, these surely have slowly lost their luster but I will finish them anyways. Nothing exciting about hearing about a guy who can beat games but wont sit in the chair to do it. Its a bit more upbeat in 2019 though andd I feel my future is bright and redemption nears though. I dont think I would have written these if not for a change of mentality recently, so look forward to a positive summary next post.

Part 1
Part 2
Part 3
Part 4
Part 5
Part 6
This section is a bit erratic as I had to jump around a lot and it may not flow well. I almost didnt post it and instead did a short version, but it did the story no justice imo. The tail off in these posts are going to end with a lot of self reflection and things I have learned through all of this. I hope to keep the remainder to less than 3-4 parts but could genuinely make it 30-40 if I wanted to. This part (the bulk of it) is going to cover the least amount of actual time but its a pretty important juncture in my life.
I am about 3-4 weeks clean of opiates but I am still withdrawing badly, though no where near as bad as I was early on it was still bad. Could not sleep was always sore and achey sneezy runny nose etc etc. They say a month is what it takes to cold turkey but I was taking so much that it wasnt pacing well. One thing I realize in my current day and I will probably elaborate on it more later but taking oxy or opiates was only about the high for a month or two in the beginning. If you know anyone who struggles with it they arent taking it to get high, they are taking it to not hurt, taking it just to feel normal. Opiates are so unbelievably addicting its mind boggling to me. They are the most evil thing I have ever encountered.
I am driving to go play as I am trying to start playing live for income and I reach into my center console to grab some aspirin (it kinda helped the joint pain and physical pain of the withdraw) and I dump a few aspirin out and a little blue/green pill falls into my hand. As it turns out there were three 30s in that bottle. I remember this so vividly. I havent had an ounce of opiates since WSOP. Im 2-3 weeks from being clean of withdrawal and the worst is behind me, and I stumble onto these. I clench them in my hands for the rest of the drive to the casino. I even call my dad to tell him to try and get motivation to rid of them. He told me to throw them out the window obviously. Its why they were clenched in my hand. I rolled down the window and just hang my hand unable to open it. I cant bring myself to get rid of them. I remember laughing at it. A weird thing about being on oxy/heroin then getting clean is the emotions, despite being in pain from withdrawal I was laughing again, I hadnt laughed in a while. Emotions are strong when you havent felt them in a long time, whether it be anger or joy or sadness it is overwhelming. Anyhow I convince myself that I can handle doing 3 more and be fine. So I crush one up and blow it. I go into the casino to play, and within an hour I am getting the other two crushed up. My tolerance was still sky high even after a month roughly. I blow all 3 in an hour and play for a couple hours and leave once they wear off, withdrawals end up increasing a bit and now I am just wanting some hydrocodone to make the withdrawal go away.
So now I break my 3-4 weeks clean (immediately following WSOP) and buy some loritabs. These just took the pain away. There was no high from them but it took a lot to make the pain go away, was taking 3 10s at a time 5-6 times I day. Ashamedly I was actually snorting these too :/ which is a lot of powder and aspirin.
My body has been waking up from not having oxy. What I mean is oxy numbs you physically and mentally. You could jerk off for 3 hours and make your dick bleed but you wont get off. Youre emotionally and physically numb. So my sex drive is coming back. I have about 6k to my name. I am playing cards one day and I just snap. I lose it. I cant handle the monotonous live game. Not to mention I was playing 1-2nl as thats what was available in Tulsa outside of weekend nights and a scheduled big game.
So I text a girl I messed around with before oxy. I havent talked to her in 18 months she had no clue I was even doing oxy but I still remember the text I sent (for the most part)
I sent her a text asking her if she wanted to go on a mini road trip. (Im absurdly blunt and overly analytical and it hurts me with women) She asked to where and I responded by jokingly saying theres a good satanic cult meet up in Kansas. A few messages exchange and I tell her to just pack a bag and I will be there in an hour. She agrees. I run home and pack myself a bag. I go to pick her up and shes having second thoughts and I convince her once again. We go to the airport (yea its changed to flying somewhere) with intention of taking the next flight out to anywhere really. Well Tulsa has few options so we have to go to Dallas and we will assess from there. I only have cash mind you and they rape you for buying cash. We get to Dallas and its either Vegas or Orlando. Vegas it is. We get to Vegas and I we have no reservation so we go to Caesars (decent rooms much cheaper than Bellagio etc) and all they have are Junior Suites. Fuck it give me two nights (its a Friday and were going back Sunday because she works Monday) at 650 a night. Then we eat a couple nice meals and money already running thin.
Now, I am supposed to be having fun on this trip. I like this girl actually, shes a great girl. However what I have yet to mention is when I ran home and packed my bag I left my bottle of hydrocodones... every passing hour after flying to Dallas I am further into withdrawal. I end up drinking most of the trip. I have the shits. Im sneezing. Im paranoid and over analytical and it just made an awful trip.
At one point on that Saturday night she gets frustrated and cries and tells me “I like love you _, but this _” the first __ is my name, the second I dont remember. I basically just got hit with the first part and I actually cry, standing in front of the Bellagio fountains. It was a combination of frustration with life having gone broke, opiate withdrawals, was drunk trying to mask withdrawals and that aided it and lastly hearing her say that just hurt me because I had clearly hurt her. I had messed with her 18+ months ago but was always playing cards never really made any efforts, essentially unavailable emotionally. Then I take her to Vegas and I am drinking and so fucking paranoid to fool around with her cause I am withdrawing and will blow a load in seconds or wtf ever else. Those words hit me hard though. I am too dumb to know that she felt that way. That is pretty much my assessment of that and a common theme with women for me. I do not pick up on subtle cues very well, and I am so analytical that any cues I do pick up I find a way to chalk it up to something else.
She was angry the rest of the trip and I never once talked to her again. I tried once but its irrelevant. I am in my early 30s and have never had a serious relationship in my life, thanks to poker and drugs. Honestly I think poker is the biggest reason. At the end of the day when you first start playing poker it is an addiction. I at one time in my life was a poker addict (spoiler alert I still play) and it consumed me. Time away from poker was spent altering my mind. I never was available to anyone. Before I played poker I had normal encounters with women. The longer I played the worse I became.
Ok I will try to rev this up a bit, those two or three months I reflect on a lot though. I think about her occasionally and had even meant to tell her this stuff at one time but never did (shes still unaware of everything outside of the shutdown breaking me, and that was more me than the shutdown).
So part 6 ended with me selling my truck. This actually happens now. I get home from Vegas with her and have relief with hydrocodones. I shatter my relationship with her, and actually one with a good friend who had owed me money and I had him run his card for my flights from Dallas to Vegas to save like 2000$ and made the mistake of saying I will write his debt off which was 3x what the flights cost. In fairness he used a company card, I agreed to terms and failed them. He was a very good friend to me and I have never talked to him since either. Partly because he is kind of a psycho (I say this kindly, hes just good friend or a bad enemy, not much in between) and told me if I ever see him I should turn around and run (to this day if I see him I would be tempted to do so, the guys a brute, hits harder than anyone I know, and I could write several pages of stories about him, I have seen him shatter the front window of a brand new corvette with a punch, not joking, shattered not cracked, be it a fluke or not I saw it, was in 2010 sometime, he went to jail obviously, quite the ramble on this but am tempted to share the story as its something out of a movie)
Fuck it. Short version.
At a bar 2010 with him his roommate and one of my friends in Dallas where he lived and we were visiting. His roommate walks over to a table of girls to hit on them and comes back saying her brother is mad. His roommates back turned to the table, my friend Joey is facing that table. The brother starts walking towards us angrily as Joey watches. This guy has 40lbs on Joey, but Joey is a freak of nature.
Once in range Joey swings and lays this guy out cold. Bar fight ensues. Joey breaks another guys jaw and has the original guy knocked out and the first guy in torn up. Theres a pile of security and shit with Joey on the bottom. It gets split up (Joey never got hit somehow, or had no bruises) and the bouncers are taking him outside. On the way outside with bouncers routing him by pushing him in front he bumps a table. Asshat hero at the table with two guys two gals says “hey buddy watch the table”. Joey breaks his right arm free and swings around his body (guys on his left) and literally knocks this guy on his back while still in his chair. Basically got a wind up and a 180 degree turn for that punch.
Outside they push him off and tell him to get the fuck out of here (cops are called already, I am not sure why they didnt try to detain him tbh, he fucked 3 guys up at this point) so Joey being Joey he kicks a potted plant over walks out towards his car to drive off and on the way to his car hes walking between two cars, one of which is this brand new 2011 Camaro and he just shatters the window... hits it dead center and fucking shatters it. Cops arrive pretty quickly and scoop him up.
One of the guys had his jaw wired shut and one needed reconstructive surgery on his nose if I remember right. The third guy got out good I guess. There was a fuck load of blood though.
Ok back to my shit. Had to tell that though, its a nuts story that doesnt even sound real. I wouldnt believe it from an anonymous source either, its ok.
As 2011 wears on I am losing control further. I end up having to move out of the house I dump like 40k into (while my sister refuses to show me any of the note progress and its now her house again, though she loses it eventually)
I have nowhere to go basically. My parents wont let me come if I am doing opiates. So I end up staying with a friend in Joplin MO. I am unable to stay afloat on pills and poker. I go busto a few times. Random money would arrive to me from old carbon checks to Stars paying out to running ok on TruePoker (kept a 10-15k roll alive long enough to do opiates for a couple months) but I am bouncing from hydros to oxycontin back and forth, running out quite often.
I end up in a methadone clinic early 2012 and eventually quit doing the pills. I am beyond depressed, barely leaving the room I had at my friends house. I am sure I laid in bed for 7 days straight a time or two. I pay him no rent and have to borrow money for my clinic trips. He had the house for free via a mutual friend though. Once my True account ran out I go on poker hiatus.
From 2012 to 2014ish I play essentially no poker aside from a few hands on Intertops from left over cake money. Which I bust eventually.
One isolated poker story from this stretch goes as such. I am staying at a hotel my grandfather (poker one) owns in a small town in NE Oklahoma. Hes letting me stay in one of the cabins on the property. I drive 45 minutes 3-4 days a week to get methadone here. I am depressed have no job and hustle money somehow. I dont even know where it came from but I would stumble onto a thousand here and there.
Tulsa is having tourneys one weekend. So I go play this 350$ two day. I forget the guarantee (it wasnt wsop or wpt it was local) but I think its 100k. It is one of the two or three times I enter a casino over these two years but I bag day one and day two goes well and we end up chopping it 3-4 ways with me and another guy taking two best spots at 15-16k. I remember zero hands from this tourney.
I go back to the cabin I was staying in. I have 15-16k now. I remember being alleviated about having money. I hadnt held 10,000$ in 12-18 months. I dont play a single hand of poker with it. It was so calming to have this money, I was content and didnt want to lose a dime of it. I did buy some oxy with it despite being on methadone and it doing nothing basically. This actually all happened before moving to Joplin, so it is chronologically wrong here. I slowly bleed this money off over a couple months. I just remember the contention I had for having it.
I get accustomed to methadone eventually and move back to Tulsa with another friend. I get a normal job slinging Pizzas at Papa Johns and fucking hate it. What an awful company, they make good pizza (for chain) but they are a joke to work for. Tip those drivers well, they make shit and get (at the time) 50 cents a delivery. PJs charges people 3$ and gives 50 cents to the driver...
Later on I have a buddy who deals circuit events and I get him to help me get hired. He gets me on under the assumption I have dealt before, I have not. I have dealt at my home games back in the day a time or two, I ended up being fine. I deal an event in St Louis then am trying to get set up for Tunica, buuuut I have a felony from when I was 18 (pre poker, never told story but long story short I got B&E charges for getting into a bunch of unlocked cars) and that ends my dealing career. So I move back home as the friend I was sharing a place with in Tulsa was on methadone and genuinely the dumbest guy I know. He was a highschool friend who I partied with a long time, but he ended up fucking me out of rent and didnt pay (just kept my money) and we get evicted.
Side note to the dealing job I had. I did play some poker in St Louis because the stop was so slow. I ended up making like 800$ dealing and 2k playing 1-2nlh while there. I play no poker when returning though, once again content to have any money at all.
I am still on methadone which my parents hate me being on it for obvious reasons. I get a job near them at a mushroom farm doing manual labor. I needed the exercise. Then get hired on to work in a warehouse driving a forklift for dick money. I do this for 6~ months or so.
I will do the next part picking up here. I make an unusual style return to poker. It is a great story imo and things get more positive.

Hey guys,
This forum has been a huge help in planning my buddies bachelor party, but I wanted to run down our proposed itinerary for our trip from April 2-5. We are coming from Florida, have a group of 11 guys ages 25-30, and are staying at Planet Hollywood. We fly in early Thursday and don't fly until 10 pm Sunday, both direct flights with JetBlue.
Thursday:
-Land at 11:45 am. Head to PH and try to check in early, then go hit a liquor store or Walgreens to load up on water, snacks, and alcohol.
-Roam the strip and gamble during the day. See the Bellagio fountains and all the other big Strip hotel/casinos.
-Grab a decent lunch (Need recommendations)
-Hit the High Roller Happy Hour then go see Absinthe.
-Explore Freemont Street Bars and Casinos the rest of the night.
Friday:
-Good breakfast (Need Recommendations)
-Sapphire Pool Party. Renting Bachelor Cabana. (Please let me know if this is good or not)
-Regroup at the Hotel.
-Hit a nice dinner (Need Recommendations). Probably will be tough with the size of our group.
-Gamble and drink for while.
-Hit Palomino.
Saturday:
-Day Pass to spa in the morning to recuperate. May not be many of us but I know I'll be down for this. Need recommendations on good day pass spas on the strip.
-Possibly hit a traditional pool party at either Marquee, Drais, or Encore.
-Anyone recommend using the Sin City Pool or club crawl?
-Do a club crawl or hit a club since it will be out last night.
Sunday:
-Hit the Mob & Neon Museum
-Stroll Freemont one last time.
-Stroll the Strip and gamble one last time.
-Hit the hotel for a nap.
-Chill until flight.
This is a good outline of everything we plan on hitting. Was also thinking about a round of golf on Sunday since we don't fly out until 10pm. What golf courses are decently nice and about 70-100$ a man? None of us have ever been to Vegas so places to eat are where we mainly need help. Also, be as harsh as you want I don't want to waste time on something thats not worth it. We are a group that will have money to spend, I would say after booking everything each guy in our group is bringing about $1500-$2000 to spend.
​
Any recommendations are greatly appreciated we are trying to nail this trip since we may all not be back together for a long time.

I'm a Vegas regular. I travel there for work and play between 6-10 times a year. I've been to Vegas somewhere around 70 times.
Here are some tips, in no particular order.
Orleans Arena is "off strip". It is part of the Orleans Hotel and Casino. If you choose to stay at The Orleans, you will have a 10 minute ubelyft back and forth from the strip. The Strip is the part of Vegas that you always see when you think of Vegas. It's called Las Vegas Boulavard. Orleans is a property that basically has nothing around it, and there is not really much to see without a 20 minute walk to the Palms, or a 20 minute walk to the Rio.
If you are only going to eat, drink, and breathe RLCS, staying at the Orleans is probably a good idea. But if you want to experience Vegas, you want to stay on the strip.
Lodging can be had for cheap, up to more expensive. The cost of hotel rooms is usually based on the property location on the strip, as the more central hotels are the nicer ones.
Bellagio, Aria, and the Cosmo are the best places to stay that are in the middle. They will cost anywhere between $250-$400 a night. A great central location hotel that is more economical is Planet Hollywood, which is right across from the Bellagio. Rooms can be had here for closer to $150 a night.
If you go to the end of the strip, you can have rooms for under $100, such as treasure island, Park MGM, NYNY, and Mandalay Bay, and if you really want to live economical on strip, you can go somewhere like Luxor (far end of strip) The Linq (more middle) and The Mirage.
Any of the places listed above are on strip, and you can get the full Vegas experience. Hotels such as the Palms, Gold Coast, the Rio, Stratosphere, and the Hard Rock are so far off strip that they are extremely isolated from walking distance to most of the action in Vegas.
Weather.... You're going to the Western US in the Desert, the Western US in the Desert is not what you would expect in November. You will be lucky to see temperatures above 70F, and at night it will drop down into the low 40's. Bring warm clothes!
Walking around vegas:
DO NOT, and I repeat DO NOT purchase a single thing from a street vendor. They will try selling you drink coupons, VIP tickets to shows, discounted show tickets, and just about any drug imaginable. Do not give any of these people money for any reason.
While I do not any drugs, some of my friends do, and now that marijuana is completely legal in Las Vegas, everyone raves about going to Essence Cannabis Dispensary. I've been there, and it is amazing, but I can't really speak for their product.
Skanks.... DO NOT be taken advantage of the "street walkers" and "casino crawlers" that are trying to be your friend, will want to go to your room, and after "the deed" is complete, will extort you for money. The rule of thumb, if a girl approaches you in a casino, or on the strip and is acting over friendly, they are probably a hooker, and their pimp is probably within shouting distance.
You can drink on the strip, but you CANNOT have glass. It is usually cheaper to purchase liquor or beer from one of the many CVS stores on strip.
All casinos will give you free drinks while you are playing, but sometimes the waitresses are few and far between. If you are going to be at a craps table or a slot machine for a long time, it is always a good idea to tip them very well and they will come by often.
I stay at the Bellagio the most, but my favorite places to gamble (I don't play slot machines) is a place called O'Sheas in The Linq. It is a total party atmosphere with live bands, beer pong, bean bags, and tons of table games. I think there are close to 50 tables. I'm a sucker for 3 card, and can play there for 10 hours straight.
McCarran international airport (LAS) is a nice place. Do NOT play slot machines there, as the odds are the worst of any place in Nevada. If you have an Amex Cent/Plat card, they have a Centurion lounge which has a full bar, and huge food selection, all for free.
Do not take a Taxi if you don't have to. Taxi drivers in Vegas are notorious for taking "the long way home" and you will be taken advantage of. There is a huge amount of Lyft and Ubers in the city at all times of the day. DO NOT rent a car in vegas. Parking is expensive and driving is pure gridlock.
Last but not least, if you have time, go to the "old strip" which is called Freemont Street. Old vegas is amazing, and there are a bunch of places that should be seen. You can go to the heart attack grill and get spanked for not eating your bacon cheeseburger with 50 strips of bacon, or you can go to the D Casino and have dealers in underwear. Street performers are everywhere, and it is just a good time. WATCH OUT FOR PICK POCKETERS!
Food is expensive in Vegas. The days of "cheap buffets" are gone. A burgefries will set you back somewhere around $20 in the casinos, and the chain restaurants have heavily inflated prices. The best place to eat on the strip is the miracle mile mall that is attached to planet hollywood. A bunch of the restaurants in there offer amazing drink specials and very affordable food.
I hope I covered some basics, but if you have any questions, feel free to ask, and I'll help you out the best I can.

I'm 42/m from Manitoba Canada. The past year at work had me stressed so I planned a trip. I was on the fence on where i wanted to go, but this was to be a fast trip and it had to be somewhere easy and fast. I decided Vegas was the best option even though I'd be going solo, it is whatever. The weird thing is, I'm not really a social person ... lol.
I started researching tips travelling to vegas alone, things to do, where to stay and stuff like that and was starting to get excited. First things first is booking flights. I had amassed some airmiles so decided to book the flights that way. Only down side to booking with airmiles is the amount of connections. On the flight there I had 3 connections, and on the way back I had 4. I would definitely pay cash next time for a direct flight. Once the flights were booked may 3rd to 7th/19 . It was time to fill up my days.
Years ago I had stumbled upon sites to rent exotic cars and thats where I started. I immediately realized that it was a little expensive(understandable) so I found this gem of a site called Exoticracing.com and immediately booked 10 laps in a 488 gtb 900$ canadian (screw the exchange) . This is something I have always wanted to do and what better way to experience an exotic car than to whip it around a track at 200kph!!!. Exotics racing is truly amazing, right down to the shuttle, greeted at the desk when you arrive, the instruction course, the 2 laps around in the cayanne where the instructor shows you the track .. to the blistering, crazy drive in the 488 with your instructor telling you when to shift, where to brake, when to turn in .. always pushing you to go faster and faster. By the way Mike is the best instructor there tbh. I will definitely make a point of doing this again only I will drive more cars on my next trip
I've also always wanted to see a cirque du soleiel show so I bought a ticket for "O" at Bellagio. Truly a great show and a must see. My seat was terrible though, I sat to the far left of the theatre in the 2nd row from the front, I missed a lot that was happening at the centre of the stage when the pre-show was happening, and missed a lot that was happening at left stage with each act. But all in all, I would recommend this show to anyone. It was amazing the acrobatics these people can do. FYI, If your ticket says (splash Zone) on it, don't be alarmed, you won't get soaked, maybe a light misting from splashing in the pool.
And lastly I booked the Vip reality tv tour. Where the tour guide took you to Tanked, Pawnstars, counts Kustoms, world of toys, the sports memorabilia store, and american restoration. Tbh I shouldn't of booked this tour. I was truly more interested in counts Kustoms, vegas rat rods and american restoration. Pawn stars just doesn't peak my interest. But to be fair, the tour guide was amazing, he had a lot of fun facts about vegas, and he had a seemingly bottemless pit of facts about all of these shows. The thing I hated the most was these venus were so boring to look at, I guess I wouldn't expect the stars to be there all the time, but lets be honest, thats truly what you wanna see, right? We did get to see the toy expert that comes on pawn stars and when we were at American Restoration Rick Dale was there working on an old 50s truck and he came out for pictures!. Each stop was 20 mins, there was more driving then stopping, would not recommend. I would certainly do the other tour which ends at vamped for lunch/supper. Don't ever go on these tours expecting to meet stars.
So what did I do between and after all the stuff I had planned? I put about 50 000 steps/ day on my fit bit walking up and down the strip!!! looking at casinos, all the little stores, the people, everything, there is so much to see in Vegas.
Tips: Wear good comfortable shoes, you will be walking A LOT
Don't take anything from anyone on the strip, they are all an excuse to get you to stop and get money out of you, the free CD guys are the worst and the most sketchy looking.
If you drink, I found going to CVS or walgreens to buy beer was the cheapest ( think 3$ got you a king can) and you can buy them one at a time. Don't buy alcohol at the resort unless you like over paying.
A lot of people say don't shop on the strip, but I went to the fashion show to shop and didn't find the prices too bad, its the canadian exchange that killed me. I also bought couple pairs of shoes at DSW(hardrock).
A lot of the resorts have some sort of free exhibit to check out (bellagio fountain, theres also a garden inside) for one example.
I can't really give advice for people travelling with friends or loved ones, but if your solo, just enjoy your time. Don't let the big crowds fool you or scare you, try not to make eye contact with street people. Its so hard to explain the amount of things happening in Vegas, I bet you could go 100 times and not see everything.
Things I regret: I stayed at the Excalibur, probably would stay at the MGM or Treasure Island next time. The rooms were out dated and didn't have that "oh wow" factor. I think next time I would do the helicoptor tour, more shows, a better vegas tour, and maybe drop the bucks and rent an exotic for the day just for that baller factor.
If you plan on going on a trip and not spending much money, then you should probably plan a different place to go, but if you aren't afraid to spend a little, you aren't afraid of big crowds, drinking, gambling than vegas is absolutely amazing. I will be making this an annual trip for sure. Maybe next time I'll bring some friends, maybe not.

Hi guys, first time traveller to vegas here. I'm planning to go w/ a friend during Thanksgiving break, and here's our tentative plan so far. Any advice would be welcome, and i'm also wondering whether we should buy the 4-day monorail pass?
Priorities:

- After arrival, go to Walmart and buy lots of bottled water! - Also buy alcohol there - Make sure your phone works so you can Uber 

Food & Drinks:

 Alcohol - Fat Tuesday Japanese - Kabuto (NEEDS RESERVATION) $48 - $120 * 2 = $100 Minimum French - Le Cirque (NEEDS RESERVATION) $100 * 2 = $200 Probably Steak - Gordon Ramsay @Ceasar (NEEDS RESERVATION) Steak-Tasting Menu $155/person * 2 = ~$350 net 

Things to do:

- Gamble (obviously) - Bellagio Fountain Show (FREE) - Las Vegas sign photo - Walk the strip (FREE) NEEDS TO BE DURING DAYTIME - Cirque d' Soleil? - Tour the various casinos - Hoover Dam & Lake Mead (Maybe?) 

Thought this could be handy to some people heading out there, especially at this time of year. I'm a BE micro stakes donk who plays online for fun with some casino experience in London, UK, decided to head out to Vegas to see the sights and blow some money on live poker for the experience. Spent some time googling before going because there are so many rooms that it can be tricky choosing one to play at, here's my take on it. I went for 10 days and got back yesterday, only playing 1/2 and a few donkaments.
Some tips before going - most of the rooms are pretty similar in terms of quality, mostly tourists/old men with one or two decent young players. Each room will run different promos of some kind or another, I would recommend downloading the 'Bravo Poker Live' app and spending 15 minutes or so having a flick through the poker rooms - you can star the ones you are interested in plus keep an eye out for other games you might want to play (few rooms ran 1/1 PLO for example). It also shows live wait list and how many tables are running that I found to be pretty accurate. The app also details all of the promotions that the poker rooms run, for example how much you get paid for a royal etc. Also make sure you sign up for the reward cards, it's free to do, takes a few minutes and pretty much everywhere will give you $2 an hour towards food. Also - all drinks are free everywhere, including alcohol! You just need to tip the cocktail waitresses.
Ballys
I really liked it here and turned up one morning before going Grand Canyon and it had the most insane game I've ever seen - they run a (n optional) $20 straddle from any position and some guy and his friend were doing it for like an hour straight. Good cocktail service and friendly dealers, normally was at least two tables going during the day, definitely the softest games around without a notable absence of pros/crushers, I think this is because they don't do promos. They do, however, give you a free buffet when you play for fours hours or more which was awesome and I took advantage of a lot of times before eating and going elsewhere.
MGM
I liked this place because of the promo it ran - if you hit a full house you get a ticket into a raffle (they just put all the tickets into a box) and draw a ticket once an hour, if your ticket gets pulled you win $200 in cash. I was lucky enough to win it once. They also have a good full house promo thing where they put particular full houses up on the wall (for example 555TT and JJJ99) and you win a certain amount if you hit them (it was $1500 the last day I played). Pretty active room with a lot of tourists (especially crazy on Saturday night after some MMA fight or something happened in the hotel) but I did notice a lot of the same guys sipping water playing through the early hours feeding on the fish. Overall though a decent room plus you get $2 an hour in comps for food that you can use at Starbucks as well as other places in the casino. Side note - I've never seen so many insanely hot women in one place. The poker room is just off from a nightclub and you get a steady stream of some of the world's most beautiful women stumbling out wearing next to nothing on weekend evenings. Someone at our table actually paid a guy $20 at the table next to us to move so he had a better view!
Planet Hollywood
The atmosphere in here is unlike anywhere else, tunes are pumping with 10/10 birds dancing next to naked on the Blackjack tables opposite, was like playing in the middle of a nightclub. There isn't really a room as such, it's just a load of tables in the centre of the casino. Was one of the busier places, often 10+ tables running in evenings. This is the kind of place that attracts guys buying in for the maximum wearing jewel encrusted watches on both wrists and showing their buddies sitting behind them their cards before shoving on a bluff. The music brings a very noticeable tempo to the game, people play and bet insanely quickly and nearly everyone was drinking booze in the evenings, not really the place for old man nits. A guy hit a royal when I was there and got $500. Alas, the atmosphere got to me and I ended up getting pissed as a fart and dropping a lot so be careful if you get caught up in atmospheres, great action room though, probably my favourite 'unique' experience.
Excalibur
Cool room that did cheap tourneys ($45) a few times a day that turn into 5BB shove fest after an hour or so. Easy room with a lot of drunk tourists, I actually regret not coming back here and checking it out more. They do a thing where if your aces get cracked you get a free spin on a 'wheel of fortune' type thing - most of the prizes are $25 but you have the chance to win a few hundred. Seemed easy level of play with little or no pros/regs
Mandalay Bay
Only played here for a few hours, nice room next to a huge sportsbook but the tournament structure was horrible - I stupidly registered 30 minutes late and got like 10BB if that. Cash was full of people playing at the hotel and limping every hand but I only played a few hours on like a Wednesday morning so not sure what it's like in the evenings.
Flamingo
Action! Didn't play much but seemingly everyone drinks and the games are fast and loose, definitely worth checking this place out. They run 1/1 PLO too but I couldn't get a game going when I was there
Caesars Palace
I turned up here at like 5am one morning and gave it a go, left after 30 minutes. Table was full of absolute beasts with $1k + stacks, extremely noticeable step up in quality compared to other rooms and not just marginal either, I was well out of my depth. It was a really nice room to play in and the casino was cool, I was going to give it another go but didn't get around to it, I assumed there must be a lot of fish if this many reg pros were playing.
Bellagio
Really nice room and probably the most elegant casino in Vegas, twice tried getting in a game here but the waitlist was like an hour long both times (38 people!) so gave it a miss. Twice I showed up and gawped at Doyle Brunson like a tourist, also saw Negreanu as well. Looked like a lot of big pros really do play here, they have a large selection of games including mixed and high stakes. Kinda regret not sticking around and playing here just in the hopes of getting a table change somewhere near Bobby's room so I could lean over and watch those guys for an hour or so, I suspect I'm not the only one thinking like that. FYI 1/3 is the minimum game here.
Golden Nugget
This is downtown so about a 30 minutes bus ride from the strip depending on traffic. Quite a lot of tables in a tight room and it's the only poker room on Downtown (I think? Binions only had tourneys running IIRC) so you get a lot of drunk tourists wandering in off of the Freemont street show. I actually had my best session here after shoving the turn with a J on a 9TQK board and getting called by two people without a straight, this should tell you everything you need to know about the calibre of play.
Well hopefully this gives people an idea of what they're heading into, happy to answer other Vegas specific questions if anyone has any, I hardly slept and smashed the shit out of the city for a week so feel I picked up quite a bit about how it works now. Overall the games are very easy compared to your average 1/2 in London for example. Best week of my life, fuck coming home :(

Weeks/Months before:
LVMPD gets 35 new officers
CEO of MGM Resorts sells 80-85% of his stock in MGM
Soros buys $42M put-option on MGM Resorts*
Paddock makes $5M in one year as a 'professional gambler'*
Paddock purchases 33 of his 47 firearms in the last 12 months*
Paddock's girlfriend/roommate (Marilou Danley) flies to Asia on September 21. Danley claims Paddock booked the trip without her knowledge and "sent" her there to visit family in the Philippines.*
Paddock wires $100,000 to Danley in the Philippines*
Leading up to Event:
Paddock has 32-134 comped to him and after 3 days decides to add the suite 32-135 with his own cash [it is still unclear as to which room he was comped and stayed in first, as pointed out the room service bill was for 32-135]
Paddock never seen with anyone on any surveillance
Paddock has access to the service elevators, which are confirmed to have cameras on them
Room service lists 2 guests with 2 Pepsi's and a mineral water ordered (if you're drinking mineral water it could be to replace soda, but that's speculation)
Valet attendant greets Paddock on multiple occasions; claims never had to carry anything out of the ordinary for him. That article has been scrubbed from Hawaiian ABC affiliate and the valet attendant is missing and has deleted all social networks "valet isn’t missing, just overwhelmed by situation and went on vacation to California. The news station removed his interview because he asked them to"*
Report of 'you're all going to die' crazy lady with male friend at event 30-45 min prior to shooting
Paddock's pass was used to leave the parking deck. 15 minutes later while his car was out, his key card was used to enter the room*
Just before Event:
Multiple reports of fireworks moments prior to shooting
Campos is sent to investigate an open door alarm (probably a guest door) unrelated to the shooter.
Campos comes up the stairwell by Paddock's door but finds the stairwell door can't be opened (Paddock has sealed it). Campos may have heard drilling at this time.
Campos calls in to engineering to fix the door.
Campos goes down stairs, up elevator and investigates the open door alarm as planned.
After the investigation (outcome not known) Campos proceeds to investigate drilling.
Campos gets fired at in hallway on approach to the suite. We do not know if this was sustained gunfire. He is hit in the thigh.
It is reported that Campos called for help via radio and house phone but there is no evidence of this yet.
Building engineer Stephen Schuck arrives on floor via elevator without any knowledge of gunfire. Shots fired down hall as he is 1/3 of the way there.
Campos, taking cover in door alcove in hall, tells Schuck to take cover, saving his life.
A sustained barrage of gunfire ensues.
Schuck radios in report.
Campos and Schuck escape hallway during a lull in fire.
Engineering manager arrives. Gives keys to Schuck. He goes down stairs to turn off elevators. Returns and gives keys back. It is not known if this occurs before or after the main event.
~200 rounds are fired from Paddock's suite into the hallway
Campos is still present on the 32nd floor when SWAT arrives *(most of this section added thanks to 2ndSaturdaysWarrior and the info checks out as facts)
The Event:
Paddock, acting alone, fires semi-automatic rounds from 134. He then fires rapid fire rounds from the same window, despite the under-sheriff saying otherwise. Reason being is there is photographic and video evidence that shows the suite window was still in tact at least up until the 3rd automatic-type volley
Paddock then uses multiple weapons, and multiple types of cartridges (confirmed by the under-sheriff) and fires over 1000 rounds into the crowd at R91, while at some point breaking out the suite window, hurricane glass, with a hammer.
He also switches between rooms often (taxi driver video explained as him switching rooms for audio discrepancies) and before he calls it a night, locks the adjoining door, walks around back into the suite, and kills himself firing a (.357?) revolver twice over about 15-20 seconds.
After the Attack:
Zebra 20 (SWAT) is on location for about 40 minutes prior to executing the first breach on the suite, finding Paddock dead, executing their second breach to 32-134, and moving furniture around (as witnessed by the man staying in 31-134 via New York Times interview)
EMS reports taking fire near the Tropicana casino (After Paddock is dead)
Shots reported at Bellagio
Shots reported at NYNY/Excalibur
Shots reported at Aria
Shots reported at Caesars
Random helicopter is filmed in the Harley Davidson parking lot behind Mandalay Bay. Assault rifle is on the ground and a masked man enters a vehicle*
Armed mercenaries (Metro?*) escort person and/or items outside of the Tropicana while their point man clearly aims his muzzle at casino guests
Jesus Campos does not speak to media. He does not get bullet removed from leg. He has armed guards at his residence from a company that has had their business license expire in January
One of Paddock's homes in Reno is broken into, but nothing is reported missing*
Authorities found tannerite in Paddock's car, which was parked in hotel garage, as well as gas mask(s) and bulletproof vests in the suite*
At least two cell phone chargers were found in his room (police later say they matched all to his devices)*
Marilou Danley is placed on no-fly list on October 11*
Campos cancels interview with Sean Hannity October 12*
Did I miss anything?
Any edits after original post noted with *

I'm in Las Vegas, leaving tomorrow. I have been staying at Mandalay Bay and attending a conference here. I have been here during the terrible mass murder.
In the hope that this would be somewhat cathartic, I've written out what happened below. I'm not doing this to be a karma whore or to get reddit gold. Don't gild me. The text below is just a brain dump of what happened and how I feel - I haven't really tried to make it presentable or anything. Hope this is OK. Times aren't super accurate as I'm going from memory.
My manager, his son and I were finishing our meal at "The House of Blues" (a restaurant within the Mandalay Bay complex - just off the casino floor). At around 10:10pm local time, our waitress yelled out that we were to all evacuate immediately, that there was a shooting taking place in the hotel. At about the same time we heard screaming and saw people running past the front of the restaurant. We were evacuated to outside the hotel, to a loading zone or rear entry of some sort. While outside, we heard some gunshots and more screaming. It sounded like someone with a gun was pretty close to us. At this stage, we had no idea what was going on - people thought that there were gunmen shooting people in the casino and on the streets like an execution squad. As everyone thought we were in danger, we were then evacuated back into the hotel through a service entrance to another restaurant (RM Seafood), where we (about 15 of us plus a handful of staff) were sitting at tables in a function room towards the rear of the restaurant.
We sat with a pair of ladies who were attending the conference with us, from California. One of these ladies (we will call her "A") was becoming hysterical with panic, so I started talking to her and trying to calm her down; asking her about her family and pets, and trying to get her to think of something other than the situation we were in. I crouched in front of her and positioned my body to offer her some protection if shots were fired. At this point, police/military started storming the casino. We could see men with guns (who turned out to be police/military but it was hard to tell at the time with all the confusion) running past the restaurant shouting for people to get down. This was terrifying, as we expected bullets to start flying at any minute. "A" started going into shock/panic again. We all crouched around her to offer her some security/protection in case something happened and tried to put on a brave face to stop her from becoming more panicked.
After twenty seconds or so, we crawled under the tables back to a service area which led to the Michael Jackson Theatre. At this point I got separated from my boss. He (and some other people) had stayed in the restaurant and crawled behind the bar. The ladies we were with had also left their bags in the restaurant during the panic. We burst into the theatre and were told to find a seat. It was apparent that the people in the theatre had no idea what was going on - many of them were clapping and cheering as if us running in all panicked was part of the show. The people in front of us turned around and asked what was going on. We told them there was shooting going on and we'd been evacuated in here, but to keep it quiet so as not to incite panic. Three heavily armed police entered the theatre and instructed the theatre staff to lock the exit doors from the inside. They spoke over the public address system that they were responding to "an incident in the casino", and that we needed to all stay in our seats, keep quiet, and keep the exist clear. They asked that the lights be kept off.
Some people got up to see what was going on. The police yelled that they needed line of sight to the exits and for people to return to their seats. At this point, someone tried to open the door from the outside. The police officer yelled "GET DOWN NOW!" and raised his machine gun to the door. Everybody got down onto the floor in front of the seats, there was a lot of screaming. We expected a gunman to burst through the door an open fire. After a minute or so of nothing happening, we got back up. "A" started to panic again, and said she would feel more comfortable sitting near an exit, so we went with her and crouched down by one of the exit doors that led to the outside of the casino, next to the car park. I positioned myself in front of her to try and offer some protection and comfort her, and asked her to show us pictures of her children on her phone to try and help her calm down. At this point I think everyone in the theatre realised that something serious was going on, and started to take the situation very seriously. Shortly after, several more police officers arrived, and broke into teams of 2-3 per exit. They were armed with rifles, shotguns and machine guns. The police didn't seem to know what the threat was, and were acting like people with guns might burst through the doors at any minute. They kept the theatre in lock down for 2-3 hours. During this time we were not allowed to leave the theatre under any circumstances. People that needed to use the restroom had to urinate in plastic cups. We could overhear the radios that the police had on them, saying things like "reports of shots fired at New York New York, the Bellagio, the MGM Grand and several other hotels". We all thought that this was a coordinated terrorist attack. It was truly terrifying.
During the initial lockdown, the police made an announcement over the PA system along the lines of "we have heard some people saying they are carrying concealed weapons. If you are carrying a concealed weapon DO NOT DRAW IT UNDER ANY CIRCUMSTANCES OR WE WILL SHOOT YOU".
After 2-3 hours of lockdown, the police now thought that there were two shooters coming from the roof of the hotel, and that the reports of shootings on the streets and at other hotels were false. They secured the lobby of the theatre and assembled a strike team outside the lobby for our protection. They then allowed people to visit the lobby to use the restroom. At this point they moved the remaining people from the restaurant into the theatre. My boss was not allowed to bring the ladies' bags into the theatre, so he stashed them in a cupboard so they were safe. The theatre and lobby was kept under lockdown for another three hours or so while the SWAT team were clearing the casino floor and each floor of the hotel room by room. People from the conference who were still in their rooms were texting us saying that SWAT had burst into their rooms guns up, made sure there was no threat, and then left. This spooked many of the conference attendees who later required counselling (put on by the conference organisers).
We were told that the entire hotel had been marked as a crime scene, and that we would be unable to return to our rooms. The police arranged for busses to evacuate the 1500-ish people in the theatre to various places - a site near the airport, a local university, a local sports field. They asked that the elderly, people with young children, and people requiring medical attention please line up for the first lot of busses. During this time, one lady started going into a seizure as she did not have access to her anti-seizure medication. The police made an announcement over the PA system asking if anyone had any of the specific medication she required. That was the last I heard of that so hopefully she was OK.
As we were all able bodied and staying in the hotel, we stayed behind and did not evacuate during the initial rounds. The evacuation process took place over the next few hours. Over this time, through twitter, reddit and listening to the police scanner, we learned that there was only a single shooter, he was firing from the 32nd floor of the Mandalay Bay to a country music festival "Route 91" that was over the road from the Mandalay, that he shot himself, that there was over 50 dead, they had found a bomb in the killer's car, and that, thankfully, we were never in any real danger (although I would later find out that the killer's car was filled with ammonium nitrate explosive, and it was parked metres away from the theatre in the hotel's car park).
Throughout the lockdown, people were sleeping in aisles, sleeping on the floor, trying to call and message loved ones, eating and drinking food/drink from the concession stand (we were told to help ourselves at no charge), etc. People were sharing phone chargers to try and make sure we could all stay in contact with friends and family. A lady ("D") in front of us was worried about her one year old, who was in a hotel room with her grandmother. She was concerned that when her child awoke in the morning, there would be no substantial food in the hotel room. The manager of the theatre did everything he could - people were cold due to the air conditioning - had nothing to offer but napkins but did everything he could to try and make people comfortable. The theatre staff (who must have been equally terrified) were handing out water. I had a chat to some of the police, who mentioned they were getting tired and hoping that a new shift would come to relieve them soon. They had been on shift for about 14 hours.
At around 6:30am, a new shift of police came to relieve the team that had been protecting us all night. We thanked them for keeping us safe and they promptly left, thanking us for being cooperative.
At around 7:45am, the evacuations had finished. There was about 12 of us left in the theatre. My boss, his son, the two ladies we ran into, and a few more people. We were told that the SWAT team had cleared the hotel, and that we could go back to our rooms (with the exception of people staying on level 32 - I would later learn they were given new rooms). We were locked in the theatre for a total of around 10 hours. We went to RM Seafood with the ladies to retrieve their bags. We made sure they were OK and then we all went back to our rooms.
From this point forward, there were guards posted in the lobby, many more guards patrolling the casino floor. Guards with sniffer dogs walking around the hotel and conference area. Impromptu metal detectors were set up at the entrance to the conference facility. Everyone entering for the remainder of the conference would be subject to airport-style security - metal detector checks and bags searched.
We found out through talking to the hotel security staff that:

• The killer had ordered room service, and then put the room service tray outside his room, camouflaging a security camera on the tray giving him a view down the corridor leading to his room.
  
• The killer had a camera set up in his room, capturing the entire murder.
  
• They knew the killer was on level 32, as the smoke from the machine gun set off the room's smoke alarm.
  
• They had found around 23 guns and thousands of rounds of ammunition in the killer's hotel room. That the guns he used for the mass murder were mounted on tripods and fitted with scopes and "bump stocks", effectively making them into fully automatic assault rifles.
  
• The killer would use one gun and shoot at one side of the crowd. The crowd would run to the other side of the festival field. He would then switch guns/windows and shoot them on the other side of the field. Sickening.
  
• During the shooting, the hotel head of security went up to level 32 to try and evacuate innocent people. When the killer spotted him on the camera, he shot 200 rounds through the door of his room. The security guard was shot in the leg, but still managed to evacuate people.
  
• When the SWAT team breached his room (with explosives on the door), they found him already dead due to a self-inflicted gunshot wound.
  
• The SWAT team found a large quantity of ammonium nitrate explosive in the killer's car (apparently a black audi), which was parked sickeningly close to the exit of the theatre where we were hunkered down. They believe his plan was to perform the shooting, arm the car bomb and escape, meaning for the car bomb to explode and demolish part of the hotel. I'm very thankful this didn't happen as it would have probably killed me. I feel sick just thinking about it
  

My hotel room overlooks the concert area. I've kept my windows shut as I did not want to see the bodies of the victims. I was told that they were still there to allow forensic investigators to document the crime scene. The front entrance of the hotel has remained closed, and there are road closures in place still.
About half of the conference attendees left, including "A". Many have had counselling that was arranged by the conference organisers.
Since this, Trump has come and gone, and today the vice president has come and gone. The death toll is up to 58. The hotel and casino is very quiet. The hotel staff are visibly shaken.
That's my story. I'm so thankful that I'm alive and can come home to my wife and children, pet bird and the rest of my family. When I look back at the ordeal, the only thing that really happened to us was fear through misinformation and confusion during the shooting. I am not a real victim. The people at the festival that were shot are the real victims, and the people that were injured trying to help the fallen.
Through this tragedy, I have seen both how disgustingly evil humanity can be, but also how amazingly selfless humanity can be. The red cross have more blood donations than they can handle. Seeing everyone look after each other in the theatre was amazing - everyone was looking after everyone else. Seeing the footage on the news of people helping the fallen get to safety, while bullets were raining down on them from above ... Words cannot describe the bravery of these people.
The gun control debate is raging here. I have heard people say things like "after this, I will never leave home without my gun again", which to me is complete madness. I read in the news that sales of guns have skyrocketed, and that "bump stocks" have sold out of gun shops everywhere as people fear they will be banned. Again, this is madness to me. I will never return to America after this. I simply do not feel safe here knowing that people have access to these unnecessary weapons.
Take care of one another.
Love Mike.

Part 8 (has link to all before it, part 7 link has each individual link)
I expect this one to be the least popular one. Just wanted to be a cynic to open it up. I have been busy and this ones prob a bit sloppy, I didnt really proof read it or clean it up. The next one will likely be my last and hopefully the best one.
It is early 2017. I have been carrying on my usual playing 10-20 hours a week to survive. Still lethargic is best term I suppose. I just dont get excited to play anymore. I consider getting a job to remind me how shitty working is so it gives me a kick in the teeth to play poker. Then it dawns on me, I hate playing poker now.
Poker has been tainted. Everything bad that happened to me I can associate with poker. The rise and fall was poker (the fall part). The oxycontin started as a performance enhancer to log more hours. Everything I consider to be wrong in my life I trace back to poker essentially, even if just a butterfly affect reason that had I done something else I wouldnt be here.
Hating poker is not the greatest realization considering its my only means to income outside of grunt labor. I seek a job in a couple places to no avail which was fine, I didnt wanna do that either.
Several months earlier I had started playing on SWC (bitcoin site) and became familiarized with bitcoin. Thought nothing of it, it was just the currency I was winning or losing. I dont read a thing about it, I learn nothing of it. I wasnt playing a ton or even big stakes, my intention for playing online was to just stay sharp in case it ever comes back full fledge. I have 5-6 btc on this site at the most (2-3k) and I flush it playing plo and big o not thinking much of it.
Back to 2017. Its March/April~ of 2017. I am playing cards one night dicking around probably had a couple drinks and was needling the usuals etc. A guy I do not know is in the game. Looks Russian. I bet he interfered in our election... fucking commies. I dont remember how I got to talking to him but crypto had been brought up. I talk about SWC. Tell him I had a few btc but not anymore. The only other thing I remember well from the conversation was bitching about going from an iphone4 (yes I had an iphone4 from 2010-17, the same one. It barely worked. Many oxycontins snorted off the back of that phone, texts dating back to when I got it in 2010) to the 6 or 7 or wtfever I have now, which is bigger and its harder to text and drive. He just responds by saying “first world problems are the worst”. Amen brother, those Africans and Venezuelans have no clue of our struggle.
I end up talking to him a bit and it turns out he mines crypto. Has a website that sells mining equipment. He has a hell of a back story too. I tell him I am interested in mining. I have about 20k to my name at this time and I realized recently that I dont like playing poker so why not? He eventually tells me not to do it. Regardless we become friends and he is ultimately the most important friend I have ever made. I have made more positive strides mentally since meeting him (mostly work ethic, realizations, reality checks and aspirations) As silly as it sounds, when he told me “first world problems are the worst” it stuck with me. He was saying it as a joke but jokes are funniest when true. He is genuinely the smartest guy I have ever associated with also. If you run into him at a poker table youd think he was a high functioning autist. Then you talk to him and go “ohhh hes just one of those Einstein type geniuses”. His hair is usually a mess, he cuts his own hair for or has his girlfriend do it. He wears cheap clothing usually since it all covers your ass or nipples I suppose. He virtually never instigates conversation with people he doesnt know. He is really deliberate with his actions. Talks really calmly and knows exactly what he is saying. He is just on the same level at all times it seems.
Meeting him has definitely changed my life for the better. We become friends pretty quickly. I know I went on a downer after meeting him because I couldnt afford to buy mining stuff and remember wanting to (again, he told me not to do it eventually anyways).
Which will lead me to another good friend to have. Between 2015 and this point in 2017 I have shot myself in the foot not logging hours a couple times. A friend has bailed me out with a loan or short term stake a few times. He is a well off restaurant owner who loves poker more than just about anything not related to him. Every time I see him we talk about hands he played and he just eats it up, has photographic memory and never butchers a hand history which is nice. He is as good hearted of a guy as I have ever met. (Sorry if this is getting long winded giving praise to people close to me, I intend on sharing with a few people and would like them to know what they mean to me as corny as that is because I suck at doing it in real life. Plus it is kinda gay to get mushy sounding in real life, but I digress. Theyve heard virtually none of the content of this whole thread either, a ton of this stuff I have never shared) In fact he is too kind hearted. He has helped people who wouldnt piss on him if he was on fire, and people have burned him on many occasions. My only complaint about this person is he never kicked my ass and told me to log more hours or fuck off. I needed it. If I just logged hours I wouldnt need the help. Its as simple as that. I have no leaks other than the unwillingness to play (leaks as in drugs/pit games/strippers/wtf ever else) and it has hindered me immensely over the these last couple years. (Ok I do have one embarrassing leak that has been fixed for a year and change, mobile games... I have spent like 30,000$ on mobile games between late 2016 and late 2018, Lords Mobile specifically clocked me for 20k. This definitely hindered my ability to build a roll and got me into a few jams. When youre not logging hours playing youre sitting around gaming and these games arent cheap obviously)
It is around May now and my friend who messes with crypto tells me that Bitcoin is going to 10,000$. Its like 800$ at the time iirc. I own a couple from Ignition cashouts. I kind of trust him. I cant argue him on it as I have literally no mental fortitude on the subject, but I essentially shrug it off. I start watching the price on poloniex and am watching prices jump like crazy. Light bulb in head! I can buy the dips sell the peaks and have more BTC! Lets load the 2.5btc I have onto poloniex! Sell peak but it keeps climbing... “FUCK! gotta get it back before it goes to 10k! Whew. Still have 2.45 BTC. FUCK! Its dropping! Get it out before it goes to zero!”
Yea I turned that 2.5 BTC into .4 BTC. No joke. I think I ended up throwing it onto SWC and losing it once it was almost gone. I honestly forget. I had nothing when it finally hit 20k other than some shit alts worth about 800$ at most (worth 35$ now but they still reside in my locked poloniex account, maybe I will give poloniex my ID if they ever become worth more than 1k)
So I am now annoyed I didnt turn every free dollar I had into BTC. I didnt trust the guy enough and to be fair I would have been using the money I play with. Had I met the guy a year earlier (know what I know of him now) I would probably have just locked it all up and sat around waiting.
I never really get my act together in 2017. I continuously log just enough hours to get by. I just dont care. I just want a way out of this. I catch myself saying “I hate playing poker” and sometime around the end of 17 or early 2018 I start trying to censor myself and quit saying that. Saying it will only make it fester deeper. I have to retrain myself to love poker. I remember the days of playing 18-24 hours straight because I love playing. I love watching for everything I can find to get an edge. I love a situation to present itself where I can step out of line. But now I just sit down and count the minutes before I can tell myself “way to go! You put in an 8 hour shift lets pack it in!” I leave good games often times. I celebrate when games break. This is where I am mentally while I play. I cant break out of it.
Late in 2017 a close friend of mine passes away. Will call him J. He was the guy who gave me a place to stay after the shutdown in Joplin. I was still doing oxy and he never once touched the stuff knowing what has happened to me. He doesnt judge me, he is somewhat of an enabler I suppose. He just drinks does shitty coke sometimes and has a script of adderol and xanax. Literally never once does he do any with me (ive warned him xanax and opiates will kill you if you mix, which is likely part of the reason he never did it) He was a marginal poker player (relative to modern game, he was just good enough to beat the rake live but he had too many pit leaks) and took great pride in being my friend (I was the slayer in the area for years leading up to this, anyone considered the best in their area can relate, you just have the respect of the local poker community). One of my earlier live poker memories involved him. I am like 18 or 19 playing a 1-2 game at a small casino and he was there with a friend. They were the good players in the game at the time. They were having a few drinks eating nice food and laughing having a good time. I remember thinking that I want this lifestyle. Care free gambling fast paced lifestyle. I had told him this story years later and he just ate it up, constantly tried to get me to rebound, but as I have stated many many times in the last few of these I have basically waved my white flag and accepted the result of my fall.
Anyhow after living with him we always talk every few months at minimal and have something to eat when we see each other at the casino. He was somewhat disingenuous sounding he was so nice and honestly it got to a point it started rubbing me the wrong way. I still talk to him of course but less frequently. In December of 2017 I get a phone call from my friend who owns the restaurant and he is distraught. He has been at the hospital and J has passed away. The back story on this is he had gotten a phone call from old friend who was getting out of prison in Arizona with no where to go (a female). J being as nice a guy as he is drives the 20+ hours to get her and gives her a place to stay. Well shes a junky and actually convinces J to do opiates/heroin. He overdoses and dies. I hadnt talked to him in a few months. I regret it. Had I known I would have beaten him senseless and got him to quit before things actually get bad.
Going to his funeral hit me up side the head too. The way I started feeling he was disingenuous just got destroyed. I cant fathom as many people showing up to my funeral with as nice of things to say. I wrote something to say but opt out after a few people say everything I had written (except better). I regret not saying them anyways. I think I still have what I wrote tucked away with the card and his money clip that made its way to me. I stumbled across his casino players card in a box one day and it resides in my wallet ever since. This was the first close friend that has passed away in my life, knock on wood. It woke me up a bit and caused a lot of self reflection because I felt I had let him down. I lived a few miles from him and didnt drop in to see him, didnt stay in contact as well as I should have. All because I felt he was disingenuously nice when he was actually just nice, which is actually because I am a cynical hermit who hates social life these days. That was the real reason I didnt stay closer. Him being too nice was just my excuse to blow him off essentially.
Only other thing I can add is that chick he helped out didnt even go to his funeral and on top of that had tried to take his truck and clean his house out. Junkies are the worst. I was a junky but I proudly say I never robbed anyone or cost anyone anything other than emotional distress.
2018 starts and I have been decreasing my methadone every week for about 3-4 months now. I am on a low dose. Makes sleeping at night hard (get restless legs and sneezy). So I am having a few drinks any time I am at the casino playing (still just two days a week for the most part) to help get through those late night sessions when its worn off and I feel crummy. I get down to 15mg then 10mg and in March of 2018 I get asked if I wanna work for a week with my crypto friend. His friend is setting up a farm with 500 miners and needs help. I agree. The pay is in excess of the work (in my opinion) at 3k and I have no expenses, but I dont argue obviously. Before we leave town I have to pick up my week of methadone (at 4mg now) and so I do that. I never take any of them, I have the box still. Never opened it. They remain at my apartment as a reminder, the box carrying the 6 doses and a stack of receipts for every 75$ week that I kept in the box, several years worth, at least 9-10k worth of receipts, and that shits CHEAP compared to oxy. So I am finally off of opiates. I take kratom still but its essentially non addictive in comparison. Ill cede that I am reliant on kratom but if it disappeared tomorrow I wouldnt panic, I would be fine.
So I fly to Denver with my friend and meet his friends half brother who was instructed to rent a box truck and the three of us were to drive from Denver to Washington carrying like half a million dollars worth of hardware. Its early March, the roads arent exactly great. Half brother of his friend rents a truck with no middle seat though. Its absolutely miserable. Whoever sat middle was sitting like a fem boy legs closed and knees up high from the drive shaft hump. It was un fucking real how uncomfortable the middle was. So like I stated the roads were not great, we drove on ice for 5-6 hours straight (while my crypto friend did about 30 minutes of it before I decided I value my life and banned him from driving, he was literally doing over 70 on this ice sheet when I checked the gauge. I forget what he said, I will fail to make it sound as good but he said that he is protected and can not die, if we wreck he wont get hurt because of some universe stipulation that protects him. He said we would get hurt but he wouldnt. (I will have him tell me this stuff again and leave it in comments, it was pretty funny and I kinda want to think he believes what he said as it was clearly not something he just came up with).
I end up driving like 18 of the 24 (one shot) hours it took as letting crypto friend drive was out. We make it set up a farm over a couple days then we go to Vegas. Not only do we go to Vegas but we fly a private jet. Not only do we take a private jet but his buddy has all four of us our own room at the Bellagio for 5-6 days. I remember having a 4500$ win at Bellagios 500$ cap 2-5 game... ran pretty salty. I only remember one hand worth bringing up, but I closed action and called 400$ pre with 67o with 3 others all in. Just flop 77X and send me the money. (Was drinking, gamble gamble). I cold called that also, some fish had opened massive and a 300$ stack just ripped a 400$ stack rejammed and I had called out of bb knowing fish will call off his 400~. This is actually a leak I have in poker. I will go over it because it has history.
Dating back to online my biggest leak was playing vs short stacks. Everyones biggest leak obv (6m setting). There were a few min buyers on Carbon and I got to the point I put them in pre every time they opened my bb from button, so long as they opened 75%+ from button or close to it. This has carried with me live, if I can gamble 3-4 ways (4 specifically) I will basically do it any time its 100bb~ or less with about 40% of hands if I can close action safely. I am a bit of a degenerate in this sense. I will flip for 1k if I have 10k to my name. It mostly came as a way to loosen up tables (the flipping blind preflop) at my local casino with players who give action. I am pretty snug in general but I cant refuse a flip when it presents itself and I cant refuse a fun gamble with short stacks.
I spend the month in Vegas during WSOP and run absurdly bad. Lose every big pot I play it seems. Switch to PLO the last half of the month and go a week straight without tripling my buy in up at any point. Just insane. Looking back I play rather poorly in PLO. I have been spoiled with my PLO games back home (which have been dead for about a year) and could get away with playing 50% of hands and no one ever bet big draws or anything not the nuts basically. I didnt adjust at all is what the issue was. Was just a frustrating month.
So I return and take a stake from a friend. I barely play still. Same ole same ole.
The last thing I will cover for this section is an incident late in 2018. One of the girls who is the floor at my local casino takes kratom also, we talk about it a fair amount. She has some 10mg percocets (mini oxycontins essentially) she gives me two of them. I havent had one in several years. I have been off methadone for 6-8 months at the time. I am eager to feel what I felt all those years ago, having no tolerance. So I take them home even though I know I shouldnt.
I get home and take both of them. What transpires is almost depressing. It frustrates me to no end that I realized that I have no desire for these. It affirms that all the money I flushed wasnt about the high, it was about the not withdrawing. I basically stated this in an earlier post but this is the event that I learned this from. I dont even enjoy it. I just sink knowing that I gave my life away for these. I have never recovered thanks to pain killers. Never once after 2011 have I ever looked in the mirror and said “finally, I have finally recovered what I fucked off”.
I am going to finish this thread off on the next post most likely. It will likely be long and take me a while to compose as it will cover my current year, and put a bow on it. The story basically climaxes a couple posts back, these surely have slowly lost their luster but I will finish them anyways. Nothing exciting about hearing about a guy who can beat games but wont sit in the chair to do it. Its a bit more upbeat in 2019 though and I feel my future is bright and redemption nears though. I dont think I would have written these if not for a change of mentality recently, so look forward to a positive summary next post.

Day 1. My fiance and i land and get to Mandalay Bay by about 7:30am, we figured it would be too early but tried to check in anyway. When we were checking in I asked if there were any complimentary upgrades available; She said we could move from a resort King strip view for a double queen room at the Delano. We decided to stick with the resort king which paid off because they ended up waiving our resort fees. Since we had a good amount of time until our room was ready we went to the buffet before going to the nearest dispensary and got a pen vaporizer then went to the Shark Reef aquarium which was pretty badass. We then worked our way down the strip going through each resort from Mandalay to MGM then down to Paris, we started getting close to time to start getting ready for dinner so we headed back to Mandalay. They said they would text/call between 12-1 for the room to be ready and we hadnt heard anything by 4, so we went to the counter to ask about it and that's how we got the resort fees waived. We got up there and my fiance took a short nap and i went down to the casino. We went to Batista's for my birthday dinner and i got a picture with Gordy. We walked back to the room from there with a few stops along the way and called it a night.
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Day 2. We're early risers so we get the most out of our trips, so by around 9:30 we started walking towards Bruxie's at NYNY for some chicken and waffles which was incredible. We rode the roller coaster at NYNY which was honestly a lot better than i expected, then we walked through all the resorts down to Ceasar's and got some Fat Tuesdays after my fiance did some shopping, then took the tram from Excalibur back to Mandalay to hang out by the pool for a little while. We had a reservation at Blue Ribbon Brassiere during their social hour and got a ton of oysters and stopped at an Art-o-Mat before leaving. We then went back to NYNY for our 7:00 show of Zumanity which was fantastic. When we got out we went across the street and got some orange julius then back to Mandalay; We gambled a little bit then went upstairs, showered and ordered some room service.
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Day 3. Pretty early morning again, we get crepes at 48th and Crepe and walk around the Aria until the Hofbrauhaus was open. We had a couple masses each and had some food while we were there for a couple hours. Then we were off to Fremont street, we hung out there for a few hours and did the zipline. The pictures turned out good enough for us to actually buy them all haha. We then went to the stratosphere and got to the top before deciding neither of us were down to do any of the rides but we got the amazing view. We found a cool spot to have a preroll we got at the dispensary before getting a lyft in one of those self-driving BMW's back to Mandalay to get ready for dinner. We got ready and went out to SLS for our dinner at Bazaar Meats which was by far the best meal of my life, expensive but absolutely worth it. Then we went to see the Bellagio fountains then had another preroll before making our way to the Skyfall lounge for our final night out, the view was incredible.
Day 4. Up early to check out and give the bell desk our bags, i was obsessed with Bruxies so my fiance got Krispy Kreme donuts and i got bruxies again. We went down to the Venetian for a little while to shop and look around. No matter how old i am I'll always be suckered into the magic shops and those damn magicians are good sales people lol. We went back through our random casinos that we had vouchers for to get our money or play a little and tried to soak in our last walk through the strip before heading out to the airport. We didn't do a lot of drinking or anything crazy but it was by far the best vacation i've ever had and we'll be back as soon as we can. Thank you to everyone who gave suggestions on where to eat and what to do, it definitely helped out a lot.
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TLDR; My fiance and i had a badass first time in Vegas, ton of great food and great people. Zumanity was fantastic and we'll for sure be back.

I know you guys probably get a ton of opened-ended "what should I do in Vegas" posts, so I'll try to keep mine focused on the specific questions I have.
I'll be in Las Vegas in the middle of February for a work conference and I had a few questions about my stay. Using a throwaway, because I don't like people knowing when I'm away from home for an extended period. Call me paranoid.
A few of my questions revolve around the fact that I'll more than likely be on my own. No one that I know from my company or otherwise is going and I'm not the super out-going type. I might happen to dumb into a group of people to pal around with, but I'm not counting on it.
Brief background information:

• I'll be based out of the Wynn Las Vegas.
  
• My company is paying for things like the airline tickets, transport between the hotel and airport, meals (minus any alcohol), the conference fee, and the hotel room. Anything beyond that is on me (entertainment, extra transport, etc.).
  
• I make a half-decent living so I should be able to afford most costs, but I don't want to blow the bank, either. I just want to keep everything within reason.
  
• The conference is going to take up the majority of my time, but I'll probably be free after 6:30ish each night.
  

Transport

• I've gotten the impression that the best way to get around seems to be the bus lines, so I'm planning on getting a three-day pass for The Deuce at some point. Is this the best strategy? Where are these ticket machines located?
  
• What would be the best way to get to something off the strip? I'm not planning on straying too far, but I don't want to be anchored to just the bus routes, either. Is walking really the best option? How expensive/responsive/effective is Uber? Taxis? should I consider a cheap rental car? What is parking like around town?
  

Entertainment
Basically everything here has the underlying question of if it would be too weird or awkward to do on my own. Also, I should note that I'm not a gambler. I'll probably do something easy to just say I did it, but I'm not going to spend any time on it.
Attractions

• Fremont Street - I'll probably go at least once just to see the whole "Fremont Street Experience" thing. What should I check out while I'm there?
  
• The High Roller - Is this worth my time? It looks like a cool thing to check out, but I'll only be able to purchase the more expensive night-time tickets.
  
• Gun Ranges - I'm a self-admitted gun nut and wanted to look into the possiblity of hitting one of the ranges. I'm specifically interested in machine gun rental since I'm pretty well versed in anything short of full-auto. After a bit of research, I found that the rates are a little higher than I expected. What are some of your personal favorites and/or the least expensive choices?
  
• Bellagio Fountains - Are these worth seeing? It seems silly to ask since it looks like they cycle every 15 minutes at night, but I'm going to have to plan travel to any location not within walking distance of the Wynn.
  
• Hotel shows - I know the Wynn has shows that I believe I get free access to with my room reservation. Are there any others nearby that I should be sure to see?
  
• Strip Clubs/Topless Bars - I know these are notorious money-pits, but are there any nearby to the Wynn or on Fremont that would be worth checking out? A quick scan shows that Deja Vu and Sapphire seem relatively close by. Also, it seems like there are ways to avoid outrageous cover charges, mostly through coupons. Do they accept viewing the coupon on your phone? I don't know that I would have access to a printer, and these are totally out if the cover charge can't be avoided. I'll probably be looking for places to have a few drinks here and there so are there any of these where you can just go in and sit at a bar?
  

Safety

• What areas around the touristy-locations do I need to be wary of? The last thing I need is to find myself in a bad area.
  
• Any common scams I need to be aware of?
  

Thanks guys! I appreciate any insight you might be able to provide.

I remember awhile ago Bellagio being the shit but last time I went, it just couldn't compare to the likes of Wynn, Bacchanal, or Wicked Spoon.

Part 8 (has link to all before it, part 7 link has each individual link)
I expect this one to be the least popular one. Just wanted to be a cynic to open it up. I have been busy and this ones prob a bit sloppy, I didnt really proof read it or clean it up. The next one will likely be my last and hopefully the best one.
It is early 2017. I have been carrying on my usual playing 10-20 hours a week to survive. Still lethargic is best term I suppose. I just dont get excited to play anymore. I consider getting a job to remind me how shitty working is so it gives me a kick in the teeth to play poker. Then it dawns on me, I hate playing poker now.
Poker has been tainted. Everything bad that happened to me I can associate with poker. The rise and fall was poker (the fall part). The oxycontin started as a performance enhancer to log more hours. Everything I consider to be wrong in my life I trace back to poker essentially, even if just a butterfly affect reason that had I done something else I wouldnt be here.
Hating poker is not the greatest realization considering its my only means to income outside of grunt labor. I seek a job in a couple places to no avail which was fine, I didnt wanna do that either.
Several months earlier I had started playing on SWC (bitcoin site) and became familiarized with bitcoin. Thought nothing of it, it was just the currency I was winning or losing. I dont read a thing about it, I learn nothing of it. I wasnt playing a ton or even big stakes, my intention for playing online was to just stay sharp in case it ever comes back full fledge. I have 5-6 btc on this site at the most (2-3k) and I flush it playing plo and big o not thinking much of it.
Back to 2017. Its March/April~ of 2017. I am playing cards one night dicking around probably had a couple drinks and was needling the usuals etc. A guy I do not know is in the game. Looks Russian. I bet he interfered in our election... fucking commies. I dont remember how I got to talking to him but crypto had been brought up. I talk about SWC. Tell him I had a few btc but not anymore. The only other thing I remember well from the conversation was bitching about going from an iphone4 (yes I had an iphone4 from 2010-17, the same one. It barely worked. Many oxycontins snorted off the back of that phone, texts dating back to when I got it in 2010) to the 6 or 7 or wtfever I have now, which is bigger and its harder to text and drive. He just responds by saying “first world problems are the worst”. Amen brother, those Africans and Venezuelans have no clue of our struggle.
I end up talking to him a bit and it turns out he mines crypto. Has a website that sells mining equipment. He has a hell of a back story too. I tell him I am interested in mining. I have about 20k to my name at this time and I realized recently that I dont like playing poker so why not? He eventually tells me not to do it. Regardless we become friends and he is ultimately the most important friend I have ever made. I have made more positive strides mentally since meeting him (mostly work ethic, realizations, reality checks and aspirations) As silly as it sounds, when he told me “first world problems are the worst” it stuck with me. He was saying it as a joke but jokes are funniest when true. He is genuinely the smartest guy I have ever associated with also. If you run into him at a poker table youd think he was a high functioning autist. Then you talk to him and go “ohhh hes just one of those Einstein type geniuses”. His hair is usually a mess, he cuts his own hair for or has his girlfriend do it. He wears cheap clothing usually since it all covers your ass or nipples I suppose. He virtually never instigates conversation with people he doesnt know. He is really deliberate with his actions. Talks really calmly and knows exactly what he is saying. He is just on the same level at all times it seems.
Meeting him has definitely changed my life for the better. We become friends pretty quickly. I know I went on a downer after meeting him because I couldnt afford to buy mining stuff and remember wanting to (again, he told me not to do it eventually anyways).
Which will lead me to another good friend to have. Between 2015 and this point in 2017 I have shot myself in the foot not logging hours a couple times. A friend has bailed me out with a loan or short term stake a few times. He is a well off restaurant owner who loves poker more than just about anything not related to him. Every time I see him we talk about hands he played and he just eats it up, has photographic memory and never butchers a hand history which is nice. He is as good hearted of a guy as I have ever met. (Sorry if this is getting long winded giving praise to people close to me, I intend on sharing with a few people and would like them to know what they mean to me as corny as that is because I suck at doing it in real life. Plus it is kinda gay to get mushy sounding in real life, but I digress. Theyve heard virtually none of the content of this whole thread either, a ton of this stuff I have never shared) In fact he is too kind hearted. He has helped people who wouldnt piss on him if he was on fire, and people have burned him on many occasions. My only complaint about this person is he never kicked my ass and told me to log more hours or fuck off. I needed it. If I just logged hours I wouldnt need the help. Its as simple as that. I have no leaks other than the unwillingness to play (leaks as in drugs/pit games/strippers/wtf ever else) and it has hindered me immensely over the these last couple years. (Ok I do have one embarrassing leak that has been fixed for a year and change, mobile games... I have spent like 30,000$ on mobile games between late 2016 and late 2018, Lords Mobile specifically clocked me for 20k. This definitely hindered my ability to build a roll and got me into a few jams. When youre not logging hours playing youre sitting around gaming and these games arent cheap obviously)
It is around May now and my friend who messes with crypto tells me that Bitcoin is going to 10,000$. Its like 800$ at the time iirc. I own a couple from Ignition cashouts. I kind of trust him. I cant argue him on it as I have literally no mental fortitude on the subject, but I essentially shrug it off. I start watching the price on poloniex and am watching prices jump like crazy. Light bulb in head! I can buy the dips sell the peaks and have more BTC! Lets load the 2.5btc I have onto poloniex! Sell peak but it keeps climbing... “FUCK! gotta get it back before it goes to 10k! Whew. Still have 2.45 BTC. FUCK! Its dropping! Get it out before it goes to zero!”
Yea I turned that 2.5 BTC into .4 BTC. No joke. I think I ended up throwing it onto SWC and losing it once it was almost gone. I honestly forget. I had nothing when it finally hit 20k other than some shit alts worth about 800$ at most (worth 35$ now but they still reside in my locked poloniex account, maybe I will give poloniex my ID if they ever become worth more than 1k)
So I am now annoyed I didnt turn every free dollar I had into BTC. I didnt trust the guy enough and to be fair I would have been using the money I play with. Had I met the guy a year earlier (know what I know of him now) I would probably have just locked it all up and sat around waiting.
I never really get my act together in 2017. I continuously log just enough hours to get by. I just dont care. I just want a way out of this. I catch myself saying “I hate playing poker” and sometime around the end of 17 or early 2018 I start trying to censor myself and quit saying that. Saying it will only make it fester deeper. I have to retrain myself to love poker. I remember the days of playing 18-24 hours straight because I love playing. I love watching for everything I can find to get an edge. I love a situation to present itself where I can step out of line. But now I just sit down and count the minutes before I can tell myself “way to go! You put in an 8 hour shift lets pack it in!” I leave good games often times. I celebrate when games break. This is where I am mentally while I play. I cant break out of it.
Late in 2017 a close friend of mine passes away. Will call him J. He was the guy who gave me a place to stay after the shutdown in Joplin. I was still doing oxy and he never once touched the stuff knowing what has happened to me. He doesnt judge me, he is somewhat of an enabler I suppose. He just drinks does shitty coke sometimes and has a script of adderol and xanax. Literally never once does he do any with me (ive warned him xanax and opiates will kill you if you mix, which is likely part of the reason he never did it) He was a marginal poker player (relative to modern game, he was just good enough to beat the rake live but he had too many pit leaks) and took great pride in being my friend (I was the slayer in the area for years leading up to this, anyone considered the best in their area can relate, you just have the respect of the local poker community). One of my earlier live poker memories involved him. I am like 18 or 19 playing a 1-2 game at a small casino and he was there with a friend. They were the good players in the game at the time. They were having a few drinks eating nice food and laughing having a good time. I remember thinking that I want this lifestyle. Care free gambling fast paced lifestyle. I had told him this story years later and he just ate it up, constantly tried to get me to rebound, but as I have stated many many times in the last few of these I have basically waved my white flag and accepted the result of my fall.
Anyhow after living with him we always talk every few months at minimal and have something to eat when we see each other at the casino. He was somewhat disingenuous sounding he was so nice and honestly it got to a point it started rubbing me the wrong way. I still talk to him of course but less frequently. In December of 2017 I get a phone call from my friend who owns the restaurant and he is distraught. He has been at the hospital and J has passed away. The back story on this is he had gotten a phone call from old friend who was getting out of prison in Arizona with no where to go (a female). J being as nice a guy as he is drives the 20+ hours to get her and gives her a place to stay. Well shes a junky and actually convinces J to do opiates/heroin. He overdoses and dies. I hadnt talked to him in a few months. I regret it. Had I known I would have beaten him senseless and got him to quit before things actually get bad.
Going to his funeral hit me up side the head too. The way I started feeling he was disingenuous just got destroyed. I cant fathom as many people showing up to my funeral with as nice of things to say. I wrote something to say but opt out after a few people say everything I had written (except better). I regret not saying them anyways. I think I still have what I wrote tucked away with the card and his money clip that made its way to me. I stumbled across his casino players card in a box one day and it resides in my wallet ever since. This was the first close friend that has passed away in my life, knock on wood. It woke me up a bit and caused a lot of self reflection because I felt I had let him down. I lived a few miles from him and didnt drop in to see him, didnt stay in contact as well as I should have. All because I felt he was disingenuously nice when he was actually just nice, which is actually because I am a cynical hermit who hates social life these days. That was the real reason I didnt stay closer. Him being too nice was just my excuse to blow him off essentially.
Only other thing I can add is that chick he helped out didnt even go to his funeral and on top of that had tried to take his truck and clean his house out. Junkies are the worst. I was a junky but I proudly say I never robbed anyone or cost anyone anything other than emotional distress.
2018 starts and I have been decreasing my methadone every week for about 3-4 months now. I am on a low dose. Makes sleeping at night hard (get restless legs and sneezy). So I am having a few drinks any time I am at the casino playing (still just two days a week for the most part) to help get through those late night sessions when its worn off and I feel crummy. I get down to 15mg then 10mg and in March of 2018 I get asked if I wanna work for a week with my crypto friend. His friend is setting up a farm with 500 miners and needs help. I agree. The pay is in excess of the work (in my opinion) at 3k and I have no expenses, but I dont argue obviously. Before we leave town I have to pick up my week of methadone (at 4mg now) and so I do that. I never take any of them, I have the box still. Never opened it. They remain at my apartment as a reminder, the box carrying the 6 doses and a stack of receipts for every 75$ week that I kept in the box, several years worth, at least 9-10k worth of receipts, and that shits CHEAP compared to oxy. So I am finally off of opiates. I take kratom still but its essentially non addictive in comparison. Ill cede that I am reliant on kratom but if it disappeared tomorrow I wouldnt panic, I would be fine.
So I fly to Denver with my friend and meet his friends half brother who was instructed to rent a box truck and the three of us were to drive from Denver to Washington carrying like half a million dollars worth of hardware. Its early March, the roads arent exactly great. Half brother of his friend rents a truck with no middle seat though. Its absolutely miserable. Whoever sat middle was sitting like a fem boy legs closed and knees up high from the drive shaft hump. It was un fucking real how uncomfortable the middle was. So like I stated the roads were not great, we drove on ice for 5-6 hours straight (while my crypto friend did about 30 minutes of it before I decided I value my life and banned him from driving, he was literally doing over 70 on this ice sheet when I checked the gauge. I forget what he said, I will fail to make it sound as good but he said that he is protected and can not die, if we wreck he wont get hurt because of some universe stipulation that protects him. He said we would get hurt but he wouldnt. (I will have him tell me this stuff again and leave it in comments, it was pretty funny and I kinda want to think he believes what he said as it was clearly not something he just came up with).
I end up driving like 18 of the 24 (one shot) hours it took as letting crypto friend drive was out. We make it set up a farm over a couple days then we go to Vegas. Not only do we go to Vegas but we fly a private jet. Not only do we take a private jet but his buddy has all four of us our own room at the Bellagio for 5-6 days. I remember having a 4500$ win at Bellagios 500$ cap 2-5 game... ran pretty salty. I only remember one hand worth bringing up, but I closed action and called 400$ pre with 67o with 3 others all in. Just flop 77X and send me the money. (Was drinking, gamble gamble). I cold called that also, some fish had opened massive and a 300$ stack just ripped a 400$ stack rejammed and I had called out of bb knowing fish will call off his 400~. This is actually a leak I have in poker. I will go over it because it has history.
Dating back to online my biggest leak was playing vs short stacks. Everyones biggest leak obv (6m setting). There were a few min buyers on Carbon and I got to the point I put them in pre every time they opened my bb from button, so long as they opened 75%+ from button or close to it. This has carried with me live, if I can gamble 3-4 ways (4 specifically) I will basically do it any time its 100bb~ or less with about 40% of hands if I can close action safely. I am a bit of a degenerate in this sense. I will flip for 1k if I have 10k to my name. It mostly came as a way to loosen up tables (the flipping blind preflop) at my local casino with players who give action. I am pretty snug in general but I cant refuse a flip when it presents itself and I cant refuse a fun gamble with short stacks.
I spend the month in Vegas during WSOP and run absurdly bad. Lose every big pot I play it seems. Switch to PLO the last half of the month and go a week straight without tripling my buy in up at any point. Just insane. Looking back I play rather poorly in PLO. I have been spoiled with my PLO games back home (which have been dead for about a year) and could get away with playing 50% of hands and no one ever bet big draws or anything not the nuts basically. I didnt adjust at all is what the issue was. Was just a frustrating month.
So I return and take a stake from a friend. I barely play still. Same ole same ole.
The last thing I will cover for this section is an incident late in 2018. One of the girls who is the floor at my local casino takes kratom also, we talk about it a fair amount. She has some 10mg percocets (mini oxycontins essentially) she gives me two of them. I havent had one in several years. I have been off methadone for 6-8 months at the time. I am eager to feel what I felt all those years ago, having no tolerance. So I take them home even though I know I shouldnt.
I get home and take both of them. What transpires is almost depressing. It frustrates me to no end that I realized that I have no desire for these. It affirms that all the money I flushed wasnt about the high, it was about the not withdrawing. I basically stated this in an earlier post but this is the event that I learned this from. I dont even enjoy it. I just sink knowing that I gave my life away for these. I have never recovered thanks to pain killers. Never once after 2011 have I ever looked in the mirror and said “finally, I have finally recovered what I fucked off”.
I am going to finish this thread off on the next post most likely. It will likely be long and take me a while to compose as it will cover my current year, and put a bow on it. The story basically climaxes a couple posts back, these surely have slowly lost their luster but I will finish them anyways. Nothing exciting about hearing about a guy who can beat games but wont sit in the chair to do it. Its a bit more upbeat in 2019 though and I feel my future is bright and redemption nears though. I dont think I would have written these if not for a change of mentality recently, so look forward to a positive summary next post.