There were two clearly subpar players at my table in the $2000 tournament today, so I was happy when the one to my immediate right open-raised to $375, and, after my call from the button with AA, the other called from the big blind. The pot has $1175. Flop is perfect: A65 rainbow. I decide to slow-play, but there's no need. The cut-off bets out $375, and everyone calls. The pot has $2300. The turn is a 7. Ick -- am I behind with only 10 outs now? Hard to see someone calling or betting with 98, but it's checked to me, I bet, perhaps too much at $1500, but the big blind calls. The pot has $5300. The river is another 5, and I never find out what the big blind was trying for, because he folds to my $2500 bet. Perhaps he had 76 and thought he was counterfeited, in which case that 5 was very bad for me instead of giving me the second nuts. Still, I was glad that, when these two busted out, I had gotten more than my fair share of chips from them.

I go into Round 3 with $10k, about 1.5 times the average stack. I have a couple of hands where I lose $1000 or so. I then pick up KK on the button; a tight player has raised pre-flop. (Earlier, the same player folded and showed AKo when I limp-reraised with QQ -- I was in early position, and the walrus-mustached fish had already limped under the gun, and I had been aiming for another player who had regularly been raising unraised multi-way pots.) I figured he'd give me action this time if I reraised him again, so I made it $2300 to go, a slightly bigger than pot-sized raise. He thinks about it and calls. Flop is JT5, two diamonds. He checks, I bet $2500, and he goes all in. It's only another $1075, so I have to call even if I know I'm beat, and I likely am -- either TT, JJ, AA, possibly but unlikely JT or 55, and very unlikely AK or AQ on a draw (with diamonds, the draw is the favorite even) or a mistaken QQ or AJ. Sure enough, it's AA, and I'm crippled, giving up the remaining 1800 of my chips AJ v. AQ.

Not much I can do on that hand. Harrington says that if you pick up KK v. AA, you should go broke in most circumstances, and I did.

Only one other hand I have a question about. Big stack at the table, though not much bigger than mine, raises my $100 big blind to $275 from early position. He's an aggressive player, but seems to be pretty solid. I've been getting good cards and have been playing a lot of hands and winning a lot of pots without having to show down, including both hands with AA, so the table probably reads me as loose. It's folded around to me, $425 in the pot, $175 to call, I have ATo--what do you think I should do?

So, an unsuccessful trip to Las Vegas. I lost quite a bit of money, though not as much as I lost in the stock market this week.

In the last 30 hours, I had my largest winning session at blackjack ever.

Unfortunately, I also had my largest losing session at blackjack ever, and that was twice as big. Rather than run out of money, I'll blog about my six hours in the Wynn Classic yesterday. 270 players, $1000+$60 buy-in no-limit, top prize $93k.

The first few rounds were very nice for me. We started off with 4000 chips, or 80 big blinds. My table has a lot of empty seats, so we're playing fast and picking up blinds from a lot of dead stacks; I even win a couple of pots when we see the flop. As the table grows to seven players, I limped in with a pair of deuces in a multi-way pot, and made a lot of money on a QJ2-K-Q board against Qx.

Four-player hand in raised pot, I have KQ diamonds, board is all under cards with two diamonds, I call a big bet on the flop, and then take it down when a king comes on the turn; I probably bet too much on the turn.

I called a middle-position raiser from the BB with 87s. The board comes 862, I bet out, he makes a small raise, I reraise him all in, and he lets go what allegedly was a better hand, and I pick up another 2000 chips. He mutters about the fish at the table.

Another hand, lots of limpers, I complete my small blind with 5-spades/4-clubs, flop is 853 clubs. Checked around, turn is 2 of hearts. Mutterer bets, I call with my open-ended straight and second pair. River is a high club, we check it down, and my tiny flush beats his set of twos, and now the guy is totally irate. I apologize for my fishy play.

I make a fishy under-the-gun limp with JTo, end up heads up against the big-blind. He calls my opening bet on a T99 board, turn is a 7, I call down about 1000 chips total and lose to his J8 straight.

Blinds are up to 100-200. Two seats to my right, with a smaller stack of 6000, raises to 800; I reraise to 2400 with AKo. He calls, we're heads up. Flop is AKJ with two clubs. Check, I bet 2400, he calls. Turn is 8-clubs, I have no clubs, he bets the rest of his stack, I call, he turns over KT without clubs, and the river doesn't help him.

Last hand of the third round, I open-raise from the button with 900 with KJo, small blind who just joined the table reraises to 4000, I let it go, which probably got used against me later. But I go into the break with 15000 or so chips, a little more than twice the average stack, and enough to play 30 rounds of blinds and antes.

The fourth round wasn't so good for me, however.

Unraised pot, six players, I have the big blind of K6o. Flop comes AK6 with two clubs, my hand can only get worse, so I bet out 900. Folded to short stack small blind who reraises all in; I call those 300, he turns over A3. Turn is 4, river is 4, I'm counterfeited.

Four times I get into a pre-flop raised pot, hit the flop only once and won a small pot when I hit my dominated three-outer, had to let it go the other times.

I call an unraised four-way pot from the button with T8hearts, and spend perhaps too much money chasing an open-ended straight that doesn't hit, and fold on the river when there's a club flush on the board to a blinged-out KFed-lookalike native in the middle of a sixty-minute chair massage. He and his diamond Rolex replaced the former KTo who had been knocked out. (I have no idea if it was Jacqueline Passey's GK in the Rolex, but it's fun to pretend that it was.)

Blinds go to 200-400, 25 ante. I raise to 1800 with AKs from middle position, collect the blinds. Next hand, see AKo. I open-raise to 1900 this time. Folded to small blind, who thinks about it, lets it go; the mutterer in the big blind, reraises all in with 4400 chips, and, with 2.5-1 odds, I call what turns out to be his 55. I have ten outs by the time the river comes (well, eight, because it turns out that the small blind and one other hand folded an ace), but don't improve. A shame it wasn't the small-blind who reraised all in. But he gets me on the next hand: I limp with 66, he reraises from the button all in with 2400, the 2-1 odds and chances that he's reraising with AK or AQ requires me to call, and his JJ holds up.

I get myself back up to 12000: under-the-gun raises to 1200, I discover KK in the big blind, reraise to 3400, he calls that but doesn't call my 2000 bet on the flop.

I'm in the big blind with a vaguely-playable hand, two players are in for 1200, I call, don't hit and fold to aggression. I lose another 1500 chips when I cold-call a pre-flop raise and fold when I don't hit.

Cut-off open-raises all in for 2800. I call with KQs on the button. Small-blind re-raises all in, I let it go, and two AK hands split my money. I get it back a round later when I bust the seat to my right with AQ v. AJ.

I blind away another 900 chips without anything playable, try to steal the blinds from the cut-off with an open-raise of 1200, fold my J9 to a tight big blind's reraise to 3600 that would have pot-committed me.

Near the end of the fifth round, I'm down to under 6000, I need to make a move. Under-the-gun mutterer raises to 1200, I'm in middle position with AJo. I decide to let it go--there are very few hands he'd lay down in that situation, and the majority of the rest have me dominated or leave me with only one live card. But perhaps I gave him too much credit; he could well have overthought it and folded a better hand, and that folding equity plus the chance of a bad beat (and the need to make a move soon) means I should have played, but I didn't want to give him the privilege of busting me. What do you think? As it turns out, it likely didn't matter.

Round 6, blinds are 300-600, antes of 50, and after four unplayable hands, it's folded around to KFed in the small blind, who raises to 2100. I go all-in with AJo, and he calls, turning over KJo, giving me 4-1 odds that only get better after a AK5 flop reduces him to two outs. But he does get that third king on the river, and IGHN in 108th place or so. Or, at least, if not home, upstairs to watch the sunset.

I also played a one-table satellite earlier Thursday morning, but the table was so tight and the blinds moved so fast we were eventually playing bingo. I built up a few chips stealing blinds and winning a pot, knocked out someone in a race, doubled up a small stack losing A9 to AK, was crippled when my A8s cut-off position raise got reraised all-in by a 99 smaller stack in the small blind and I had to call, and got knocked out in sixth place when my KQs lost to A2 on a board of K54-3-x. Wasn't very interesting or fun; too much luck involved.