Note from ZJ: I was really lazy tonight, and Nat offered to write a blog, so I let him. If you do not like it, please direct all hate mail to natarem@gmail.com.

Late at night on Thursday Dec 15th, Oz (aka Ozzy 87, formerly known as bigslick789) and I realized Gigabet could very well make the WPT final table of the Five Diamonds $15K event and that it could be a fun trip to go see Gigabet play. After he made the final table, we decided on a whim to book tickets to Vegas to go see the final table taping. We also were invited to go to LA with ZeeJustin after our time in Vegas.

Oz and I left his house in Staten Island at around 7 am on Friday for the Newark airport. After stumbling around the airport trying to figure out where to check-in, we eventually managed to board our 9:20 flight to Las Vegas. We arrived around noon Vegas time, took a cab to the Bellagio and got a room with a pool view (our first room wasn’t made up at all, so they upgraded us). The final table didn’t start until 7 PM local time, so we had around 6 hours. We headed over to Gigabet’s (Darrell Dicken) room to say hello and to wish him good luck. Sheets (Eric Haber) and emptyseat88 (Scott Fischman) were in the room along with Gigabet’s brother and his parents. We left with sheets and Scott to get some food at Noodles in the Bellagio. After a great lunch, we headed to Scott’s house in Henderson to kill some time prior to the final table. After sitting around for a bit, it was time to head back to the Bellagio and make sure we got seats to see the final table taping.

Once we got back to the Bellagio, we headed back to Gigabet’s room to say good luck again and to get our tickets for the taping. We then went downstairs and took our seats, which were obviously in the Darrell Dicken seating area. We happened to be next to the Patrik Antonius section, which contained who’s bad (Robert Mizrachi), Exclusive (Noah Boeken), Marcel Luske and E-WeE (Eric Mizrachi). Gus Hansen and The Grinder (Michael Mizrachi) later showed up to sweat Patrik as well.

Play started off with immediate action, as the first pot went to the turn. Patrik quickly established himself as the table captain, taking down most of the big pots. Gigabet never managed to get anything going and he went out in 5th after getting in behind in pretty much every pot where he showed down a hand. We left the final table for a few minutes to talk to Gigabet and the rest of the group. I headed up to our hotel room, where I met ZeeJustin, who had just recently arrived at the Bellagio after driving in from LA during the day. Scott and a few other players were also in our hotel room watching the closed circuit broadcast of the final table. We eventually went back downstairs to watch the rest of the taping, after which we got a quick bite to eat at Cafe Bellagio. After that, the three of us headed upstairs to go to sleep.

Saturday consisted of all-day online poker. The Pokerroom Grand started at 12 PM local time, so Oz and ZJ woke up for that. They also both played in the Party Million Guaranteed at 1:30 PM local time. Unfortunately, they didn’t get much going in either one, although Oz got up to 70K in the Grand before losing all his chips on a 3h 4h 7h Kh Xx non-paired board with the Ah versus 5h 6h. Oz also played a bunch of cash games on UB while ZJ played a ton of tables on PokerStars to try to get TLB points to make sure he won the weekly contest. He managed to set the weekly point record in that competition with around 2960 points. Oz also entered the Party $215 special later that evening and managed to get to the top two tables before running into lordhutty’s aces in the big blind.

We headed out of Vegas at around 1 AM after Oz busted to drive back to ZJ’s LA apt. The trip was very smooth except for one crisis: we almost ran out of gas. Soon after passing the Zzyzx Rd exit on US-13, ZJ noticed the gas light was on in his car. Luckily, I’d brought my Magellan navigation system, which can help you locate the nearest gas station to your current location. The only problem was that we were in the middle of the Mojave desert and there was literally nothing within 50 miles of us. We determined that our best course of action was to try to make it to Barstow (about 50 miles). About 5 miles shy of Barstow, we found a 76 gas station where we finally managed to fill up. The tank took 19.2 gallons on what I’m assuming is a 20 gallon tank, so we cut it pretty close. Anyway, we made it back to his place in Sherman Oaks and passed out on his couches.

Oz and ZJ woke up “early” again to play the Party and Stars Sunday tournaments. Once again, they didn’t get much going, but that’s the nature of huge field MTTs. ZJ played a bunch of STTs while Oz ran some 50/100. We went to an Ahi Sushi restaurant for dinner then saw a late-night showing of King Kong. I enjoyed the movie for the most part (as did Oz and ZJ) and I’d recommend that everyone go see it, but be prepared for a very long movie. Oz stacked a few more people at 50/100 NL on UB and we went to sleep.

Today we haven’t done that much other than go to the gym, but tomorrow we plan on going to an amusement park with JJProdigy (formerly known as TheTimeIsUp) and then we’re going to go to dinner with shaniac. Thanks to ZJ for letting me be a guest writer on his blog.