Roy.C.O - the Royal Casino Online

KNPR To Air Oscar Goodman's HARDTALK Interview!

[UPDATE: Due to Tony Curtis' death, KNPR will air an archived interview with the late star on Friday and bump the Oscar-BBC interview to Monday. Will post the time when I know.]

KNPR General Manager Flo Rogers emailed me earlier to let me know that she has obtained the rights to re-broadcast the BBC World Service's "HardTALK" episode featuring the weirdest, most entertaining interview Mayor Oscar Goodman has ever granted. (Here's my take on it from when it first emerged.)

This is great news because the BBC site only made it available for a week and did not provide a podcast. Rogers said that they will air it on State of Nevada at 10:30 a.m. on Friday and that it will also become part of the show's podcast feed so you'll all be able to hear it, own it, savor it, share it with your kids and at cocktail parties and stuff.

By the by, I encountered Goodman the day after that blog post went up at Temple Beth Shalom while shadowing Rep. Shelley Berkley on Rosh Hashanah for a feature. He interrupted my interview with Berkley to say hello and we had this exchange:

Berkley: Oh, Mayor! Oh, Mayor! This is Steve Friess...
Goodman: The Jewish Steve Friess!
Berkley: Yes!
Friess: I've gotta tell ya, I listened to this interview you did with the British guy? Goodman: The toughest interview I ever had in my life.
Friess: Oh my God, it was a riot to listen to. And you didn't lose your cool or anything.
Goodman: I tell ya, I got more e-mails from London, saying I'm the coolest mayor they've ever seen.
Berkley: Ha! You are!
Goodman: Every question this guy -- and he was a smart guy -- every question he asked me was negative.
Berkley: That's what Steve told me.
Goodman: He was blaming me, that there's no water, that's my fault. The foreclosures are my fault. The weather was too hot, that was my fault.
Friess: He said, 'Why didn't the mayor tell Sheldon Adelson and Steve Wynn to stop building?'
Berkley: I ask myself the same question!
Friess: Did you know that this was what this guy does?
Goodman: No, I didn't know that. I said, 'Uh, what did I do this for?' For a half an hour I had to defend Las Vegas.
Friess: Considering the times that you've gone nuts at journalists, I was waiting for you to just explode.
Goodman: Couldn't do it because they tell me like 15 million viewers were watching.
Friess: You also said you're the only politician in Las Vegas who hasn't been indicted.
Berkley: Hell-o-o-o?
Goodman: Well, the only local...anyway, Happy New Year.

Hear what all the fuss is about for yourself when they re-air it on Friday or subscribe to KNPR's State of Nevada podcast feed and wait for it there this weekend.

Bracelets: Nouveau Riche Bling or Traditional Badges of Honor?

By Pauly
Los Angeles, CA

Bling.

That's what it's all about, at least what all of those rap and hip-hop videos I watched on MTV were trying to relay to me. Bling is good, and when it comes to poker, we're blinded by the bling bracelets.

I've written about bracelets in the past. It's definitely not the most manly thing in the world, nor is it practical or meets societal standards of affluence (like say a Rolex). However, bracelets are a tradition, and the WSOP has a deep-rooted history, so it's natural that bracelets are an integral part of that tradition.

In these tumultuous times, we're confronted with one of those "what came first -- the chicken and the egg" quandaries...

Have bracelets become a manufactured goal that keeps amateurs and pros chasing the dream, sort of like the donkey cart and carrot analogy?

Are bracelets important when assessing a player's ability and/or career because we say they are important, or have bracelets always been important and we're just reacting to the need to quantify things in life?

And another question I've come up with is for the post-modern poker pro -- do pros play in bracelet events because they consider bracelets are the best judge of skill, or do they strive for a bracelet because that's what they've been told is vital since the moment they started playing poker?

Everyone has opinionated answers on those questions. I've heard them all and even came up with different potential half-baked answers along the way, not to mention more questions, which happens when you actually sit down to think about these matters. The fact of the matter is that right now bracelets are immensely valued. Draw your own conclusions if they are over-valued or under-valued, but the current perception in the marketplace is one of immense value. Bracelets will continue to matter now and in the future unless alternative forms of judging skill and/or merit come along -- whether it's a new tournament series to determine supremacy or a new program that computes an overall score based on a complex formula (incorporating both live/online play and tournaments/cash games) created by Bill Chen that determines a player's rank at any given moment. It's sort of like a golf handicap, credit score, Q rating, and batting average all rolled into one. We'll call it Chenmatrics, and only Bill Chen, the Pope, and Kevin Mathers know where the secret database is located.

The problem with a universal ranking system is that poker is too big to quantify. You got online play. You got brick and mortar. You have tournaments and cash games. You have Vegas, Reno, AC, LA, Tunica, Melbourne, Paris, and London... not to mention everywhere else in the world where a sanctioned poker game is being played. But shouldn't underground games count? How about high-stakes Chinese Poker matches among the titans of the universe? And how about all those sick sick sick cash games being played in Malibu and in the Hollyweird Hills where studio execs and young actors are blowing their wads for a shot to play against the Big Dog du jour, who got whisked into SoCal via private jet? Hypothetically speaking, if Durrrr wins a $400K pot off of Leo, shouldn't that count too?

The nerds and geeks constantly want validation in terms of grades and scores. You can't blame them. It's a nerd thing deeply rooted in being awesome in the academic world for so many years and getting shit on in real life, so, they nerdy academic types base all of their self-worth on grades and rankings, and want to push forth that stringent quantitative system onto the world, especially when it comes to poker. But even the best educators in the world think it's absurd that doing well on a single exam or series of exams proves extreme and thorough knowledge of an individual subject.

Poker is difficult to grade. Many organizations keep some statistics and for the most part, that's what we (the royal we as in the poker industry) use to determine a player's worth in poker. Agents use stats to determine if a potential client's past performances can be translated into a valuable piece of player marketing to online websites. Backing syndicates and stakers scrutinize online stats when determining which horses they want to add to their stables. Poker reporters often check the stats to see if someone has been flying under the radar, or if they indeed have come from out of nowhere. But the drawback of using those databases, is that they sometimes create more confusion when you have players with a common name (e.g. James Carroll and David Baker), or foreign players who use different spellings of their names or have names don't translate perfectly into English.

As a poker writer and reporter, the Hendon Mob database is a handy tool to conduct research on the fly when covering a live tournament. Pocket Fives continues to be essential in tracking online tournaments.CardPlayer and Bluff both have built comprehensive databases tracking online and live players. PokerTableRatings and HighStakesDB track the high-stakes online cash games.

But even if a higher authority, let's say Bill Chen's super-program Chenmatrics, compiled statistics from a number of categories and morphed them with cash games stats in order to spit out an actual grade, would that even suffice? Do poker players want numerical grades like school children or health food department handing out grades for clean restaurants? For most of the year, Gus Hansen struggled at the online tables. So should the Great Dane walk around with a scarlet "F" etched onto his muscle t-shirt? But, Hansen had a profitable September with all As in both online and live play, so what does that exactly mean?

The nerds in the poker community are not the only ones who are demanding a ranking system. The players themselves want something that they can look at to see how they stack up against their peers. In the rigid and competitive world of sponsorships, players want to be able to show their overall worth -- but right now, there's a half a dozen different leader boards for Player of the Year honors. Bluff and Card Player each have their own, along with WSOP. Even the WCOOP on PokerStars tracked player of the series, in addition, Stars and other online sites track their own players' yearly results in order to give them recognition and to even spur competition.

In the last year or so, the bracelet prop bet has overshadowed actual bracelet events. The perfect example was June 6, 2010 at the WSOP which I chronicled in a recap titled Day 10: Most Likely You Go Durrrr's Way (And I'll Go Mine). The high-stakes community in poker is very small. It's an elite fraternity of players and they all held their collective breaths that evening in June when Tom Dwan almost won a bracelet, which many of them were betting against. For the richest of the richest players in poker, the bracelet does not mean as much to them as it does to other players. Many of them look at bracelets as something of personal amusement and used for betting purposes, sort of like credit card roulette and lime tossing. For some of those pros, they don't care about titles or bling. They just want the money and you can't blame the purity of that pursuit, which is why many of them are cash game specialists. The Phil Iveys and Chip Reeses of the world often said that tournaments are a waste of time, sort of like that chain email that you've gotten a thousand times before that said it was a waste of time if Bill Gates picked up a penny. Tournaments are kinda like that for Phil Ivey. I often wondered if the brain trust running Full Tilt decided to lay out all these bracelet prop bets to entice their jaded players to play in the WSOP? If so, it's a brilliant idea. It's hard to ask a guy like Ivey or Dwan to jump out of bed every day and grind it out at the Rio for seven weeks straight. I covered the WSOP for the last six summers and after the second or third week, you hit the wall and contemplate suicide, then spend the rest of the time anxiously counting down the days until the WSOP is over, but in the meantime, you self-medicate with whatever is available. Any pro that's worked an entire summer in Vegas will tell you it's insane. Even the ones running good will tell you that it's impossible to remain focused during the entire WSOP. So the extra incentive of winning prop bets for bracelets increases the risk and makes the pursuit that much more juicier for pros who would rather skip the majority of the WSOP and play in only a handful of events instead of 30, 40, or even 50.

Bracelets are all we have at this point, but the numbers are skewed. Depending on who you talk to, bracelets are more valuable in the 1970s because they didn't give away as many, or, bracelets in the 2000s are important because the number of bracelets available per number of WSOP entrants has dramatically decreased. Sure 62 bracelets seems like a lot, but more players are taking a shot for one than ever before.

Then the discussion delves off into the legitimacy of the WSOP-E bracelet. Are those worth the same? Some pros don't, especially the ones making prop bets stating that winning a WSOP-E bracelet is handled differently than a regular WSOP bracelet.

Here's when I toss out my standard suggestion to the folks who run the WSOP (Ty + Seth) and ask them to decrease the number of bracelets if we're going to use bracelets like we used the "gold standard" in our financial system.

My proposal? 50 bracelet events with 40 events at the WSOP and 10 at the WSOP-Europe. This proposal has two intentions: 1) reduce the number of bracelets, therby increasing their value in the long term, and 2) increase the legitimacy of the WSOP-Europe.

The 40 events at the WSOP in Las Vegas will reduce the stress of the WSOP by at least one week, maybe even two. From a logistical standpoint, how can anyone in the poker industry argue against a shortened summer of hell? Sure, Harrah's hates that idea because it's less money for them, but that is something that will have to be compromised if poker wants to take serious steps into developing a universal ranking system.

Also, reduce the amount of donkaments and donkuli. Let's just settle on a $1,250 buy-in event and continue have at least one a week, and the weekend warriors, which are the bread and butter poker customers, have an opportunity to live out their dreams by taking a shot at a bracelet.

The added events in London should include a couple of the donkaments in order to entice North Americans to go across the pond (and to attract Brits and Europeans with modest bankrolls). Let's face it, mostly everyone who has played in the WSOP has been to Vegas many times before, so how about a new destination (and especially one where Americans won't be intimated because they speak English in England, but don't be too discouraged if you run into someone from the Midlands and you don't know what they are fookin' saying and it feels like a surreal scene from a Guy Ritchie flick)?

London has already become a hotbed of poker for the month of September with the WSOP-E and EPT London. The WPT added their London stop to coincide with the other events in London in order to maximize the limited time that out of town pros were in the UK. Well, why not start the WSOP-E a few weeks earlier with donkaments at the beginning of the WSOP-E schedule so amateurs can use their vacation time to take their family to London and get a unique poker experience out of it?

Trimming the WSOP to 40 events, and expanding the WSOP-E to 10 events means only 500 bracelets will be awarded over the next decade. That's a nice round number.

Photo by Flipchip
Alas, this is just one suggestion to a mammoth problem that has been plaguing poker since I got into the business. Poker has so many other complicated issues with cheating scandals, online legislation, and the fallout from rapid international expansion, that I'm afraid the bracelet issue is just something that everyone has an opinion about, but it never evolves past the discussions phase. If there's one thing I learned in poker -- it's that a lot of people like to talk shit, me included, but very few people actually want to lead and initiate change. And the ones who do, are often ostracized and belittled. In the real world, those who stand for change are the ones who are usually at the top of potential assassination lists. So sadly, I'm afraid that this debate will continued to be a heated debate among my friends, colleagues, pros, and on the forums -- until someone takes steps to figure out a overall authority or governing body. But then again, doesn't the creation of a centralized governing body go against the entire outlaw nature of poker, where everyone seems to thrive on anarchy?

Until that happens, the story remains the same. Bracelets matter.

Today Show, Etc., on Vdara Death Ray

Is this an important story? No. Is it fascinating and amusing and bizarre? You betcha.

Enough so, in fact, that Today had me at Miles' station late yesterday filming this bit. As I understand it, they were moving quickly so NBC could have its version done and out before CNN. Yes, folks, CNN. God I hope that means Jeanne Moos. That would be killer.

ABC posted a death ray story today, too, following up on my AOL News piece that showed the documentation that MGM Resorts knew about the solar convergence problem in 2008:

By the way, the Today Show's graphic was much more accurate, if not nearly as sensational, as the R-J's.

But I do have some hot questions:

* Why hasn't the R-J's Joan Whitely followed up yet on what is clearly the biggest, most widely disseminated story of her career? Why hasn't she done more of the MGM-knew-in-2008 story? You'd think if nothing else they'd do a media story about how much play this thing has gotten, no?

* Why haven't the local TV stations or the Las Vegas Sun followed, given the enormous national interest?

* Will this be a "bluff the listener" question or a "lightning fill-in-the-blanks" question on "Wait Wait Don't Tell Me?"

* Would this have taken off in the pop culture and mainstream media without the term "death ray"? And where can go to tip the pool attendants who dubbed it such?

Tony Curtis Dies at 85

The AP is reporting that the legendary actor Tony Curtis has died in Henderson. His downward spiral began when he collapsed in a Costco with a breathing problem in July. On July 27, Curtis' wife Jill told me he expected to make a full recovery and she was upset that his illness had prompted producers to replace him in his first Hollywood film role, a Sigourney Weaver flick called "Vamps" that shoots in November. He'd even done a wardrobe fitting, she said.

Curtis spent the latter part of his life in a state of both comfort and despair, happy in his marriage with Jill but unsettled by his film legacy, his physical infirmities and other personal issues. In October 2008, I spent several hours with him for a USA Today piece on his autobiography. It also yielded a Las Vegas Weekly column in which I wrote this:

“I don’t know why I’m so dissatisfied,” confides the star of Some Like It Hot, Spartacus, The Defiant Ones and another 120 films. “What am I looking for? What am I chasing?”

If he doesn’t know at this stage of his life, I’m not sure who or what is going to supply that answer.

You can hear that classic -- and very, very filthy -- interview because the two-part shows related to Curtis from 2008 are being reissued into "The Strip" podcast feed. It's free, so subscribe via iTunes or Zune or download PART ONE and PART TWO by right-clicking on those links.

Also cool are the pictures I took and posted of his home and art studio in Henderson. I also ended up with this (left), my copy of the book not just signed by Tony Curtis but with a line drawing of...me!

A sad day for Curtis, his family, Las Vegas and Hollywood. R.I.P.

Blogging Top Chef's Rough After Taste

My LV Weekly column on Vegas' beleaguered Top Chef cheftestant Stephen Hopcraft was all too short for the many fans of the show and those curious about the Emmy-winning Bravo reality TV show. So I've decided to supplement that with a podcast that goes into greater depth about how Hopcraft felt and what he experienced. It's in The Strip feed, so subscribe via iTunes or Zune or download it by right-clicking here.

But, of course, many of you won't have time or patience to listen to the whole podcast. So I'm also blogging some of the choice, juiciest bits. For background, of course, Hopcraft was eliminated in the eighth episode on an ill-advised flank steak. He's the executive chef at Seablue, a Michael Mina restaurant within spitting distance at MGM Grand of what earlier this year was renamed Tom Colicchio's Craftsteak. It was just Craftsteak, but Top Chef's top judge Colicchio is now such a celeb he's in a Diet Coke ad.

That's the background. Here's the good stuff about Colicchio, being robbed, the pea puree mystery, Eric Ripert, cooking in a manure pasture, that Emmy and much more.

Friess: Has Tom Colicchio ever been in here?

Hopcraft: As long as I’ve been the chef, he’s never come and dined here.

Friess: Oh really.

Hopcraft: Yeah, yeah. And I will say I’m thinking really hard, I’ve never seen Tom Colicchio in this hotel. And you can put that.

* * *

[See full post]

Recap: 2010 WSOP Day 6 Main Event - Life Is Just to Die

By Pauly
Los Angeles, CA

I pulled up Tao of Poker's semi-live blog for Day 6 and a list of Main Event money winners, and followed along with the action on ESPN. It was kinda fun to do that and see which bustout would get recorded or what hands were chosen to support whatever major and minor plotlines for the Day 6 episodes. So much happened because they couldn't squeeze in all the drama into two hours of footage.

Day 6 of the Main Event began with 205 players with Evan Lamprea out in front.

Top 10 Chipcounts:
1 Evan Lamprea - 3.564M
2 Michael Skender - 3.527M
3 Joseph Cheong - 3.357M
4 Duy Le - 3.186M
5 Theo Jorgensen - 3.088M
6 Bryn Kenney - 2.902M
7 Matt Affleck - 2.896M
8 Alexander Kostritsyn - 2.564M
9 Johnny Fucking Chan - 2.559M
10 Sebastian Panny - 2.442M

* * * * *
Oh Sweet Nuthin'

Chan on Day 5
The most tragic story of the day included the destruction of Johnny Fucking Chan's big stack. He began the day among the leaders and for the third day in a row garnered a significant amount of attention from the media and spectators. The former champ was by far the "biggest named pro" remaining and showed no signs of decay. Alas, even the mightiest of empires come crumbling to a halt, and the Chan dynasty imploded in two hands.

Chan began the day like he had been doing for most of the tournament steamrolling his table. He brushed aside Matt Keikian in one hand and Chan was just getting his funk on when it happened... he got moved tables.

Sometimes your fate in the Main Event comes down to which seat change card your given by the floor. The luck of the draw, right? Johnny Fucking Chan took his new seat at Robert Mizrachi's table and it might as well been an electric chair. On the first hand he was deal, Chan woke up with pocket Kings. He got into a raising war with Robert Pisano. For most of the tournament, Chan was playing back at anyone who tried to three-bet him -- and he was winning that battle. It happened again and Chan four-bet Pisano. However, Pisano wasn't fucking around with Chan. He held two black beauties -- As-Ac -- and five-bet-shoved. Chan called, and any glint of confidence got sucked out of his skull when he flipped over his Kings and Pisano tabled Aces. Pisano's won a pot worth over $4 million as he rocketed into the lead. A stunned Chan shipped over columns of chips to Pisano's end of the table.

Chan looked like a wounded animal. For the previous year or so, Chan has been having off the felt issues that affected his play, that is in the few events that he played. Chan seemed uncomfortable whenever I saw him inside the Rio, perhaps it had something to do with his failed attempt at trying to corner the energy drink market with All-In third rate sugar water? Supposedly, he had fallen out of the good graces with the spheres of businessmen who call the shots at big events like the WSOP.

Anyway, Chan's uneasiness at the tables disappeared around Day 2 of the Main Event. The confident and menacing Chan, who I witnessed win 10th bracelet in 2005, was back. Yes, it was not John Chan, but the original Johnny Fucking Chan was back. Until... he ran his Kings into Aces

All of that brio evaporated into thin air. Chan knew his run was over, and it would matter of time before he was done. A close up of a somber Chan reminded me of Cinderella watching the clock at 11:58 and knowing her stint in dreamland was almost over.

You could see a semblance of calm in Chan's eyes on his final hand. Chan had shoved with Jacks and hoped for a double up, but he unfortunately ran into Jon Driscoll's pocket Aces. Chan's Jacks got beaten down like a dissident in Tienanmen Square and he was eliminated in 156th place. The episode actually ended with Chan amidst the walk of shame out of the Amazon Ballroom.

* * * * *
White Light, White Heat

"The story of family" was mentioned in the intro. The Mizrachi clan, which by now you've grown to know and love, sent four brothers into the killing fields. All four survived the initial waves of bloodshed, however, by the sixth day of the butchery, only two remained. One was the light, the other the heat. I'm still trying to figure out who is who, but the Grinder and Robert remained because they won pots at the right times. Sounds so simple, right?

When the Grinder got moved to Peter Jetten's table, those two got into it right away. The board read Kc-10d-9d-Ac-5c and the Grinder threw his weight around. Jetten scurried away in fear of the Grinder. It seemed as though no one wanted to challenge the Grinder as he raced up the leader board.

Meanwhile, Robert had a lot of work ahead of his as one of short stacks in the room. He survived an all-in against overall leader Pisano when his A-Q held up against A-rag. Robert flopped a Broadway straight and doubled up. Later on in the episode Robert won a race with pocket sevens against A-Q. Robert doubled up yet again, and Norm accused the Mizrachi brothers of roiding it up.

Duy Le, a law school dropout, was not happy to have the Grinder at his table, because Grinder pummeled him into coughing up a nice chunk of his stack. Like a bully pushing around a nerd at recess. The Grinder seized the lead.

* * * * *
Train Round the Bend

Matt Affleck pissed away a big stack at last year's Main Event. The 22-year old simply lost his mud after he fired away at a pot with 10-high and got picked off. That hand sent him into a tailspin and he busted out shortly after. During his couch interview, Affleck mentioned that people often bring up the ugly incident from 2009.

"You were chipleader in the Main Event, what happened?"

Well, Affleck is a year older and for online players that's like dog years. He said he's 10x better than last year, and he definitely played with more restraint. He understood the marathon concept to the Main Event and didn't have to sprint out and play every hand -- but he still played his style of seeing a lot of flops. Affleck was given a rare chance at redemption a year after his mistake, which is amazing because some pros go years and decades before they can exorcise any lingering Main Event demons.

Affleck won the first hand of the episodes showing you how the online kids play power poker. Even though he missed the flop with Kd-10h, he chased away two opponents when he came out firing at the flop.

Affleck managed to avoid trouble when he sensed he was behind in hands. Danny Chamberlin was way ahead in one hand with pocket Queen against Affleck's Ace-sooted. Chamberlin tried to induce a bluff from Affleck, but Affleck avoided the trap.

On one of the last hands of the second episode, Danny Chamberlin's Jc-8c outflopped Affleck's Ac-2s with a Jack on the flop. When the 3s fell on the turn, Affleck picked a flush and gutshot re-draws. The river was the Qs, and Affleck rivered a crackbaby flush. Affleck checked his slim holdings, Chamberlin bet small, and Affleck did the math in his head. He called and wondered if Chamberlin held a bigger flush. Nope. Affleck won the pot and ended the episode on a high note.

* * * * *
Rock and Roll

Former tennis pro Nick Rainey got lots of face time on the featured TV table with Matt Affleck. Rainey was one of those former athletes who turned to poker after their careers fizzled out. Rainey's claim to fame is that he's Patrik Antonius' personal assistant, which means he fetches him grub, picks up his dry cleaning, and helps Antonius shave his chest.

During his fifteen minutes of fame for his couch interview, Nick Rainey explained how he met Antonius while teaching tennis at the Hilton in Las Vegas. The two became friends and Antonius offered him a chance to take care of his affairs, while Rainey saw it as an opportunity to improve his poker game from being around one of the most graceful human beings who ever walked the planet.

Rainey must have learned a thing or two from Antonius, although the Finnish boy toy is most known for his skills at the cash game tables. Rainey played with a little Finnish aggression in his loins during a hand with Christian Harder. Holding Jc-7d Harder opened and Rainey called Kc-9s. The flop was Qs-10d-4d. Harder fired away with nothing and Rainey called with nothing. The 10h fell on the turn, and it came down to which one of them was going to be more aggressive. Rainey was the first one in the pot and Harder bailed.

Rainey tried to be a little cagey, but couldn't trap Affleck, who was playing with heightened Spidey senses. Affleck's pocket eights were up against Rainey's Big Slick. Rainey flopped trips, but Affleck had been sniffing out trouble all day and avoided losing more chips in that hand.

* * * * *
Who Loves the Sun?

The Scandis love the summer because of all those bleak winters that they have to endure. No wonder that the Swedes commit more suicide per capita because of the harsh winters. I guess you can say that online poker saved lives in Scandinavia because it gave their depressed citizens something else to be depressed about aide from desperately waiting to feel the warmth of the sun.

The Scandis made a run on Day 6 of the Main Event, and you only caught a small sample of what happened as the Scandi sleeper cell was putt forth into action. Maybe we'll see that story line unfold in the next episode, but this week we got to see Norway's Johnny Lodden and Denmark's Jesper Hougaard.

Lodden got pushed off a pot from James Carroll. Carroll happily showed him TPTK. Things were not so peachy over at Hougaard's table that also included Bobby Bellande. The two instantly butted heads. On a board of Ac-3c-As-7s-6s, Hougaard shoved and Bellande folded Ah-Kd face up, and figured he was beat to a boat or flush. A part of him feared that he was folding the same hand as the Scandi. We never got to see Hougaard's hand, but Bellande was convinced he was behind.

Things got really bad for Hougaard during a hand with Pascal Le Francois. Hougaard flopped two pair, and thought he ambushed Pascal's pocket Aces. Hougaard got it all-in and Pascal was about to get sent home. However, the board paired on the turn. Pacal's Aces up would win the pot and he doubled up, avoiding an elimination. Hougaard jumped out of his chair. Scandis are usually stoic and expressionless, but he walked away muttered a trail of Danish curse words -- something about being the whore of a motherless goat -- I couldn't tell for sure because my Danish slang is not so good these days.

* * * * *
I'm Waiting for the Man

Unluckiest Man on the face of the Earth?
Bobby Bellande might be one of the unluckiest people in poker, or that's how he's being portrayed these days. The guy ran good during the WSOP, caught several breaks, won flips, and made several big calls down the stretch. He picked off a bluff from Pascal. The French-Canuck had whiffed on his flush and gutter draws, but fired at the pot anyway. Bellande nonchalantly called with only a pair of tens (I think it was second pair). Bellande won the pot with a hero call. Someone at the table uttered, "Good call."

Bellande scoffed at the compliment. "You kidding? That's a terrible call! You can't bluff a donkey."

When Bellande called an all-in with Ad-Ac, he prepped for the worst. However, much to his dismay, his Aces held up and he sent David Peters to the rail.

Then Bobby Bellande called another all-in. He held As-Ad against Jose Nadal's Kd-Kh. Bellande sensed it was coming, especially when Nadal turned a straight draw. But it wasn't a runner-runner suckout. Instead, Bellande's Aces were snapped off by a two-outer when the Kc spiked on the river. All of the Spanish players on the rail went nuts as Nadal survived and doubled up.

"It's not you... it's me," yowled Bellande.

* * * * *
Run Run Run

Eric "basebaldy" Baldwin was the focus on the secondary table with Adam "Roothlus" Levy, Russell Rosenbloom (who final tabled the Main Event the year Varkonyi won), last woman standing Breeze Zuckerman, and David "Not Bakes" Baker.

Last woman standing Breeze Zuckerman got involved in one hand with basebaldy, but he knew he was behind and bailed.

Basebaldy got a couch interview where he described himself as the "everyday all-American kid" story. He played college baseball and then turned to poker as one of those former athletes who missed competition in their lives. He won a bracelet last year and made a deep run in the Main Event, but it seemed more action was going on among his tablemates, like Original David Baker, than with him.

* * * * *
Beginning to See the Light

A few of the November Niners were mentioned including...

- Joe "subiime" Cheong was introduced after winning an early hand. Cheong ended the episode after dragging a monsterpotten. His As-Ad knocked out Chris George's Qh-Qd. That pot thrust Cheong him into the lead with almost 6 million.

- Candio the wacky Italian was in the middle of a massage when his A-rag missed the flop. He still got his opponent to fold. He must have been intimated by the massage?

- John Racener got some face time in a three-way pot. Racener flopped a set and that's all she wrote. He vacuumed up more chips for his big stack.

* * * * *
Lonesome Cowboy Bill

Here are some of my orphaned notes that included somber tales of eliminations, or solo mentions in the episodes...

- David Benyamine was virtually ignored, mainly because he doesn't say much at the table, so they didn't have much on him aside from one hand when he doubled up with Kings.

- Russell Rosenbloom wished the November Nine was around back in the days before the boom. He could have been a semi-superstar, at least gotten a bit more out of his former fifteen minutes of fame, which expired a year after he final tabled the 2002 Main Event. Not much has happened for the pro since then, except a decent showing in the Main Event. Alas, his run came to and end when he got it all in with deuces against A-K. He was sweating his exit and knew it was coming. A King spiked on the river and Rosenbloom was done.

- Jesse Martin busted out when his Ac-Kd lost to German former hoops player Michael "Detlef Schrempf" Skender's pocket Queens. You might have caught my ugly mug standing behind Jesse when he busted in 157th.

- Theo Tran's A-7 (aka the Tourist) won a flip against Pisano's deuces. Tran caught a fortutious Ace on the river and lived to see another day...or at the least a few more hands.

- Galfond was all-in with pocket sixes against pocket Jacks... and Galfond couldn't come from behind. OMGClayAiken hit the road in 141st place.

- Short-stacked Tony Dunst's got it all in with Ac-Kd in a three-way pot -- versus Qs-Qc and As-10h. A King on the flop was all Tony needed and he avoided an elimination.

- French pro Gabriel "Yellow Hat" Nassif sat at the TV table. He was involved in one hand with pocket eights against Danny Chamberlin Qh-7d. The fop was 6s-6c-3c. Chambelin fired at the flop and Nassif called. The turn ws the As. Chamberlin fired out half the pot for 120K. Nassif insta-called. The river was the 2s. With a flush on the board, Chamberlin bet 120K. Nassif reluctantly called ... and it was good.

* * * * *
Head Held High

Russian pro Sergey 'gipsy' Rybachenko joined the TV table and he was involved in two hands with Canadian amateur Gary Kostiuk, who has MS. He's been living in the moment before his MS progresses to a stage where he'd be unable to play poker. Even at the present moment, he had trouble stacking chips from time to time. He won a $330 satellite to get into the Main Event and parlayed that into a decent cash, but more so, he had a once in a lifetime experience.

Kostiuk was short and got it all-in with Big Slick against Gipsy's pocket Queens. Kostiuk turned a King and he doubled up. Kostiuk couldn't hold onto those chips after he lost a crucial pot against Christian Harder. Harder's turned two pair with Ah-5h against Kostiuk's As-Qs. They got it all-in and Harder doubled up.

But then Kostiuk got a second chance at Gipsy's charitable donations. Gipsy opened with Ad-10d and Kostiak shoved his shorty with As-9d.

"Good luck, you're gonna need it," joked Kostiuk.

"I must break you," mumbled Gipsy.

The flop was Ad-9h-7c and Kostiak took the lead as he promised. The turn and river didn't help Gipsy, and Kostiuk doubled through the Russian a second time.

* * * * *
Thanks to Flipchip for the WSOP photos.

Here's previous Tao of Poker recaps of the Main Event on ESPN:

Day 2A - March of the Mizrachis and Dannypalooza
Day 2B - Happy Jacks, Action Dan, the Jenny Crank Diet, and Pancakes with the DonkeyBomber
Day 3 - Scotty Nguyen and the Rudiments of Gruel
Day 4 - Money Money Money
Day 5 - Wie Geht's Detlef Schrempf and OMG Runs Good

For in depth coverage of Day 6, read about the straight dope on Day 6 Semi-Live Blog, and don't forget about the end of day recap of Main Event Day 6 - Never Mind the Scandis, Here Come the Mizrachis.

And don't forget about other episodes of the Tao of Pokerati podcast that Michalski, Benjo, and I recorded live from the floor of the Rio.

For more of your WSOP fix, visit the Tao of Poker's Index of WSOP coverage.

See ya next week.

More on the Vdara Death Ray

I am a very lucky reporter. I know this, that I have a knack for accidentally being in the right places at the right times. And so it was yesterday when I headed over to the Vdara pool to check out the vaunted "death ray" for myself for an AOL News follow-up to the Saturday Review-Journal cover story that has set the Web afire.

As good fortune would have it, I was there right when no less than Bobby Baldwin, CityCenter's CEO and president, was also walking the area with a group of suits and pantsuits examining what it is that Joan Whitely exposed in her R-J piece.

That is, in short, that the position of the glass, concave Vdara tower is producing unbearably hot reflections of the sun onto areas of the pool deck. The hotspot moves from place to place as the Earth rotates, melting things and singeing hair. It's nicknamed the "death ray" and is certain to be a question on "Wait Wait Don't Tell Me" this weekend or my name is Ralph.

So, anyhow, here's Baldwin, in the white shirt and red tie, leading his team as they inspect the ground in various places and then look up, unmistakably, at the side of the building.

Many people think, thanks to the R-J graphic that has been heavily replicated across the Web, that the "death ray" is something you see, that there's a glowing sphere that you can wisely avoid.

It's not so simple. It does move from place to place even during the hour I was there and you don't really know you're in it until you walk through it. Then it is very noticeably hotter. The ground, which I could walk on without sandals, became scorching, and I nearly burned my fingers touching the metal lounge chairs. I am not sure how this fellow here is bearing it, but he's going to have a rude awakening, to be sure. Hard to imagine what it must be like out there when it's 115 degrees out or how it took until late September for visitors to alert the media.

I'm pleased with my AOL piece, which did add something new to the conversation inasmuch as I've obtained letters and emails from 2008 showing that a vendor warned CityCenter officials that their solution to the known problem would be inadequate. Some of that may be the sour grapes of a vendor who didn't get a contract, but that company is the leader and innovator in the field and their warnings, as it happens, turned out to be right.

Also, I got to quote from "Five Hundy By Midnight," although my editors removed the line by Tim Dressen about your organs cooking. They also removed my reference to a hilarious Tweet from @misadventurer noting that it was ironic that the resort that starts with the letters VD would produce a "burning sensation." Oh, well!

Meanwhile, I really loved this particular shot of Vdara. With the inexplicable black background, it certainly does read "death ray."

Run!!!

Tuesday Nugs: Liv Boeree Signs With PokerStars, I'm Still Here, Glam Rock, ACH Day, and Artsy Girls Smoking Cloves

By Pauly
Los Angeles, CA

I'm at the tail end of a non-poker writing binge, so I'll return to regular scheduled writing tomorrow. In the meantime, here's some breaking news and cool new music for you to enjoy...

Liv Boeree became the latest addition to Team PokerStars Pro. Yes, she finally signed a deal with Stars. Seemed like the two were negotiating for quite a long time, but nothing like the NY Jets dealing with the Revis holdout. let's hope that Liv doesn't pull her hamstring during her first event as a PokerStars sponsored player at the EPT London. (PokerStars Blog)

This is hipster/beatnik fetish porn... photos of artsy girls smoking clove cigarettes. (The faster Times)

If you're a fan of 1980s Glam Rock, then this recent mix that we posted, Glam Rock Vol. 1: Glitter Geekin', is a must have. (Coventry Music)

If you dig the Disco Biscuits, then listen to this mix Mirror Ball and Glowsticks by Hal Masa, a friend of ours from Japan. (Coventry Music)

I posted a mini-review of I'm Still Here, a documentary/mockumentary from Casey Affleck. (Tao of Pauly)

By the way, Happy Birthday to AlCantHang! Here's a video montage/homage I spliced together for ACH...

Yep, you know the drill. NGTFOOMO.

Blogging Top Chef's Rough After Taste (Full Post)

But, of course, many of you won't have time or patience to listen to the whole podcast. So I'm also blogging some of the choice, juiciest bits. For background, of course, Hopcraft was eliminated in the eighth episode on an ill-advised flank steak. He's the executive chef at Seablue, a Michael Mina restaurant within spitting distance at MGM Grand of what earlier this year was renamed Tom Colicchio's Craftsteak. It was just Craftsteak, but Top Chef's top judge Colicchio is now such a celeb he's in a Diet Coke ad.

That's the background. Here's the good stuff about Colicchio, being robbed, the pea puree mystery, Eric Ripert, cooking in a manure pasture, that Emmy and much more.

Friess: Has Tom Colicchio ever been in here?

Hopcraft: As long as I’ve been the chef, he’s never come and dined here.

Friess: Oh really.

Hopcraft: Yeah, yeah. And I will say I’m thinking really hard, I’ve never seen Tom Colicchio in this hotel. And you can put that.

* * *

Friess: You’re away for how long?

Hopcraft: Five weeks.

Friess: Five weeks. It’s always so funny when you’re watching these reality shows and the second person gets kicked off and everybody starts crying and you’ve known them for like…

Hopcraft: ...Two days.

Friess: …two days, and you’re saying, "Oh, I’ll miss you, I’m never going to forget you."

Hopcraft: That’s a good point, and I get how ridiculous that does look, but when you’re forced into that situation, you start to build a very quick bond with these people because you’re basically being carried around in a shoebox and then the shoebox is opened up and there are people in your shoebox all of a sudden and you become friends with them really quickly because it’s like, "Oh, OK, these are the people I get to talk to, great." You do make quick bonds and quick likes and dislikes. It’s not like a normal situation where it's like, "OK, I’ve just met this guy, I’ve known them for two days but in between I’ve gone home, I’ve talked to my wife and my kids. I’ve had my life away from it." There’s no life away from it. It’s so magnified that there is that kind of comraderie where it’s like, "Oh no, the guy that I got along with best is now leaving." That would bring you to tears because then you realize it’s five weeks of you dealing with the rest of the assholes who are left, maybe.

Friess: Did that happen?

Hopcraft: For me, no. I honestly got along well with pretty much everybody. There were some people I liked more than others. The people I roomed with were the people I got along best with, which was Angelo, Timothy and Alex.

Friess: The pea puree guy!

Hopcraft: Yeah, the pea puree thief.

Friess: So what happened?

Hopcraft: The pea puree mystery! Well, he didn’t steal it. He made his own pea puree and Ed lost his pea puree.

Friess: How do you lose pea puree?

Hopcraft: You know, there’s a lot of travel that goes on. Like we cook at the Marriott kitchen and then we travel to wherever, that was the Palm Restaurant. In between, there’s a lot of other people who handle your stuff. As you see that clock ticking down, you’re packing up your stuff and it’s kinda like, "Did I get everything in there? Once that clock goes to zero, it’s not like you can go back to the refrigerator and say, "Oh, I forgot to pack my pea puree" or even check the refrigerator to see what you forgot to pack. I think it’s pretty obvious Ed forgot to pack it, thought that he had it in there and by the time he got there it was gone and Alex, coincidentally, had pea puree and that was probably the greatest twist of the season because that is the No. 1 question, did Alex steal the pea puree.

Friess: Couldn’t the cameraman tell someone if something was left behind?

Hopcraft: Their job was to pick up the story and they do that very well. These guys are pros at just fly on the wall. And a fly on the wall is never going to tell you you forgot your pea puree, Ed. [Imitates Tiffany] Eddie! Eddie, baby. You forgot your pea puree, Eddie. [Cackles]

* * *

Friess: It dawned on my while I was watching you on the show that maybe not all publicity is good publicity. You’re up there, and you’re being criticized by the judges, do you worry about what people think about your restaurant?

Hopcraft: Um, it’s a good point. And I see that. But first of all, I’m very very confident of my ability to cook and produce really good food in a restaurant. There are a number of misconceptions about the show. First of all, the name, "Top Chef," I wonder about that. I think "Top Cook" should be a better name for it because when you look at what a chef does, there’s so much more to it than cooking. Cooking is where you start and you have to be a great cook in order to become a chef, but there are so many more angles to it, like organizing a team, inspiring a team every day, dealing with the front of the house, dealing with numbers, making a restaurant profitable, filling a restaurant with people. These are all things a chef does and that I’m very good at, so I feel confident in my ability and my rstaurant’s reputation. Yeah, it definitely hurts your ego a little bit to be a chef and then you have Tom Colicchio or Padma or one of those guys say my rice sucked or this is inedible, who would eat this? But in all reality, I would challenge Tom in a heartbeat to any Top Chef challenge that he’d want to do and I know he’d say no.

Friess: Wow.

Hopcraft: He would not do that. It’s taking a great risk to get up there and put your food. Not to say anything bad about Tom or Padma or any of them. But when you do that, you’re putting your heart out on your sleeve and I know that there are a lot of chefs in this country who wouldn’t do that. All that being said, now that I have done it, I realize that it’s probably not my bag as far as going on and being able to make up a dish and be able to produce it in two hours time for 150 people in a chafing dish. It’s probably not where I’m at my best. … Once I create a dish, it takes a lot of trial and error to get a dish that I’m happy with and that I would put on my menu. … I coneive it, draw it out, make the dish five different ways, that’s the kind of thing you don’t really have time to do on "Top Chef." Not every great chef is the fastest guy who can whip something up right in front of you and you’re blown away and this is great.

Friess: One of the high points of your time on the show was the pie challenge. What kind of pie was it?

Hopcraft: It was a curry apple whiskey date pie.

Friess: I was infuriated by that part of the episode because making a pie is like that thing that normal people know how to do. And the other chefs on the show were almost angry by the notion that they had to do this. Are the high-end chefs so removed from the way that normal people cook that they don’t know how to make a pie?

Hopcraft: There’s a lot of chefs that really don’t cook a lot at home. Even though I guess that pie is something that you should ordinarily be able to whip up, I mean, a lot of people buy the crust when they make pie. Do you make your own pie crust?

Friess: Yes. I do.

Hopcraft: Well, that’s impressive. I think that making those types of things at home and compared to making it at that level is a different. I’ve never made a pie from scratch before. I know what goes into it, so obviously I was able to turn something out that was really really good and Gail really really loved it, so it was awesome.

* * *

Hopcraft: I think the highlight in my mind of all the shows for me was a quickfire challenge to shrink an entrée down to a toothpick. I wound up in the Top 3 and honestly I do believe I won that challenge. I don’t know why they gave it to Angelo. The reason why I think I won it was that I actually did the challenge. … There were three people that were on the top. One was Kevin, who ended up winning Top Chef, and there was Angelo, who came in second. And basically Angelo did a cucumber cup hollowed out with fried rice in it. Kevin did, basically, he did a soup cup and he dropped a toothpick in it. There was nothing really on the toothpick. It was a cup of soup. I actually did something where I made a potato cake, a grilled piece of filet mignon, there was a grilled vegetable in between there, so it had its starch and vegetable, and then I made it surf-and-turf with a baked scallop on top opf the filet and did a Bearnaise sauce on top of that. So that’s actually a dish you could go to Craftsteak and get today. I don’t know that you would ever find cucumber and fried rice as the main course on anyone’s menu in the country and I would challenge anyone out there to find that and, if they do, I’d be very happy to find that restaurant and enjoy such an awesome entry that I’m sure is ordered all the time, cucumbers and fried rice. If I sound a little bitter about it, I am.

Friess: Did you complain to anyone about it?

Hopcraft: Oh, yes I did. That’s not on TV, so I can’t really talk about off-camera stuff.

Friess: Why is that?

Hopcraft: Why is that? I don’t know, because I’d love to sit here and spill a bunch of stuff about off-camera stuff. Don’t pretend like I’m not mad about it, either. A lot of things happen that you don’t see. But basically it’s Bravo’s show, you know, and what they chose to look at through their looking glass, they get their Emmy for editing, correct? I was on an Emmy-award-winning show. Hah. That’s funny. … There are a lot of things I’d like to say about that particular challenge and other challenges where maybe I didn’t do so well, but maybe something happened. It is what it is. If Ed had just muttered under his breath, ‘Fricking Alex stole my pea puree’ and it didn’t get on camera but later on he chose to come out with it after the show, they would be very angry. He would be in breach of his contract.

Friess: You didn’t win, so what can they do to you?

Hopcraft: Right! They could come after me and take my upside-down house or something. You can have it, bitches. It ain’t worth nothing anymore! But you know, yeah I didn’t win, but I feel like I was portrayed pretty well on the show in some lights, I think in some lights not. But maybe there’s stuff I can do with Bravo or "Top Chef" in the future.

* * *

Friess: Your personality came across well.

Hopcraft: Good. As far as me as a cook, I didn’t come across very well. [laughs]

Friess: Did you feel like you carried the reputation of this restaurant on your shoulders when you were on that show?

Hopcraft: God, yes, I did. I felt like I carried the reputation of not only this restaurant but of Mina group and the hotel. And that was the part that was really crushing. I could tell as the season got going that I wasn’t going to be hugely successful. Although I wasn’t giving up by any means, but it was going to be really hard for me to be successful and to win the judges over. And the most crushing blow was the toothpick challenge when I put that dish up. … After I did that toothpick challenge, I felt like I was now back up to speed, I put everything on that dish that I wanted. I made that dish, I conceived that dish in a half an hour and I thought it was priceless. It came out exactly as I wanted. And when I turned and saw that Angelo beat me with a cucumber cup and some fried rice, I was like FUCK This. Fuck you, fuck you, fuck you, I’m going home.

Friess: Did you get the sense that there were certain chefs that from the beginning they expected to make it to the end and…

Hopcraft: And they gave them money? Because that was the other thing, they gave them $20,000 for that. That’s a very important point.

Friess: Why do you think you didn’t win?

Hopcraft: I honestly don’t know. I’ve been over it a hundred times. I’ve even lost sleep over it.

Friess: Really?

Hopcraft: Yeah. I mean, $20,000, I think you lose a little sleep over that. When your wife says, "Didn’t you win any money, honey?"

* * *

Hopcraft: It’s very tough to keep your food pristine as they go around the room. There are 12 people there. They start off right next to you and they go around that way and you’re like, "Aww." Then they say, "It’s kinda dry." Yeah, no shit it’s kind of dry. Shoulda ate it an hour ago, idiot. But the thing is, that crushed me, you know? Then the next day I chose ninth and I got Brazil. It really gets into your psyche. And that really stumbled me up. I felt like if I could have kept my demeanor and attitude, I would have definitely made it through a little bit longer. Even though a lot of times I was on the bottom, I didn’t have the worst dish and a lot of times they were nitpicking my stuff.

Friess: Kevin was in the bottom five times in the last eight episodes or something.

Hopcraft: He sure was. Yeah.

Friess: We were surprised at home when he won.

Hopcraft: Oh, I’m sure. When I found out Kevin won, I was like, "Hold on, who won? What’s wrong with my reception? What are you talking about?"

Friess: Who do you think was the best chef there?

Hopcraft: It’s hard ot count myself out of the best chef, but I would have to say, besides myself? Of the food that I tried, Kelly’s food was really good. I think that Angelo’s food was really good. There was so stuff about Angelo’s food I didn’t like. A lot of sugar, a lot of sweet in his savory cooking, which some people like but I don’t like it all the time. Each person has their strong point.

Friess: I guess the question should have been, which of those chefs should have won the show?

Hopcraft: I think Angelo should have won the show. When first broke out, he was like, "I’m going to crush it," he was so full with his confidence. And then second show he was on the bottom, and once he got a taste of what it’s like to get your food criticized and to be in that light, it strips your confidence to a level that started to go against him.

Friess: Did it shake your confidence when you had that?

Hopcraft: Not at first. It did toward the end of the show. I was on the bottom a lot. Actually what shook my confidence more was, like, the pie challenge. The food that I put up where I was like, this rocks, this is gonna win. I looked around and saw the other dishes and I thought, "I got this one, I’m gonna win this one" and then they they call someone else’s name. That shook me more because most of the time when I put up a bad dish, I knew it sucked and I knew why. It was a time thing, it was an ingredients thing. But when I put up those dishes like the couple that were on the top, i was like, I’m going to win, I feel totally confident I’m going to win it. And to not win it, that stripped my confidence more than anything. You know, you just swung as hard as you could at the ball, you hit the ball square and you nailed it and it’s streaming toward the fence, and it just doesn’t go far enough. And you’re like, "Can I hit the ball harder than that? No, I just hit the ball as hard as I could. What the f-bomb, man!"

Friess: Do people come in here wanting the food you made on the show?

Hopcraft: I do have a "Top Chef" menu. I sell the bacon-wrapped bass that I did on the show and I sell it quite a bit. Probably 20 a night.

Friess: Is that a dish you invented for the show?

Hopcraft: No, I sold it before that.

Friess: But you did make it on the show?

Hopcraft: I made it on the show and they hated it. And people come in here all the time and love it. And again, there were some problems with the product that I got that didn’t go the way that I wanted to go. That’s why the dish wasn’t representative as it should’ve been. But I still think it was a good dish.

Friess: Did you worry while you were being criticized that people would not come to this restaurant? People in Vegas see there are so many restaurants around here. Oh, that’s the one with that guy from "Top Chef" who got criticized all the time?

Hopcraft: Well, I’m a confident person. I think people are smarter than that. The people who have come in and had my food, they realize what level this food is at and they realize what food was being put out on that show. We’re talking amazing stuff here. When people come here and they eat the food I do and they realize I’ve been on the bottom five times, they’re like, ‘If this is food that was on the bottom five times, then I can’t imagine what the food is.’

Friess: The MGM Grand publicist gave you the Top Chef DVDs, but you didn’t watch them before?

Hopcraft: I was like, "I don’t need to watch it." Kind of an overconfidence thing, maybe. Two days before, it really dawned on me that I was going away for six weeks for a cooking competition. It takes a while to sink in, like, ‘I’m going to go on Bravo’s Top Chef right now.’ You talk about it, you forget about it for a little while. You can’t tell anybody so you try not to think about it because if you do you want to go up to someone and say, hey, guess what? I’m on Bravo’s Top Chef. No, the next one that’s coming up, I’m going to be on it. You put it out of your head. But two days before, I bought the New York one because I knew Fabio and I wanted to see how Fabio did, I sat there and I watched as much as I could in two days before I was going to leave and I was like, "OK, I’m not prepared." I’ve got to start studying recipes. I was able memorize two or three recipes before I left.

Friess: Has your restaurant seen a bump at all since the show aired?

Hopcraft: Oh yeah, definitely. There’s a lot of people who come in and who really liked me. I even had one lady come in and tell me I was an icon. HAHAHA. I was like, I don’t think so. It’s funny I’ve told everybody that.

Friess: What happens after you’re knocked out?

Hopcraft: You go and stay at a knockout hotel, the loser house.

Friess: Do the same personality conflicts that we see on TV come out there, too?

Hopcraft: Oh my God, times 10, bro! That is the most entertaining part. I had it worked out where I’d wake up around 1 o’clock and happy hour down the street started at 2 o’clock. I could wake up, take a shower, watch a little TV, stroll down there and stay there until 11 and do it again. I had just about a week of being in the loser house.

Friess: So whose personality, as it was shown on TV, surprised you?

Hopcraft: I think the way they showed Alex as such a mischevious hurtful bastard. He really came off horrible, as a horrible person. But he’s not a horrible person and I think that surprised me.

Friess: Are you a fan of the show?

Hopcraft: Will I watch it? Yeah, I think I will. I’m not sure if I’m going to get into the "Just Desserts" show they’re doing, but I am a fan of "Top Chef" and all of its spinoffs. I’ll say that. I am a fan of "Top Chef All Stars."

Friess: Tom Colicchio can be really harsh.

Hopcraft: Yeah, he can. But it’s in every chef’s nature to be like that, though. … Eric Ripert was scary to cook for, umm…

Friess: Well, he had trouble with...

Hopcraft: …saying words in English?

Friess: ...with the skewer. That was just so weird. He’s at a ballpark and he’s annoyed. Whoever put it on the skewer, he’s like, "Well, if I do this, I’m going to cut the back of my throat."

Hopcraft: How does one eat of a stick? Uh, you don’t have to shove it all the way down your mouth there, Eric. He wasn’t my favorite judge. Great chef, of course. The guy from Little Washington, I think he was my least favorite judge. I called him Thurston Howell III. He was out on the farm. It was freezing there. Not only was the food cold, but your hands were cold. And the fact that you’re cooking in a cow patty pasture and I’m serving raw salad. I’m going to give everybody here e. coli. It’s a cow pasture. Could there be a worse place to plate up and eat food? And then turn around and say you suck.

Beware the R-J Death Ray, Too!

The Internet is abuzz over the Review-Journal's great Saturday story about the Vdara "death ray," the sunlight that reflects off the side of the glass hotel tower and unbearably heats up sections of the pool deck.

It's such a terrific story that it's been linked to by even those who have sworn off the R-J and vowed not to link to them because of the paper's campaign to curb copyright infringements by suing dozens of website owners. Here's one of those examples:

Now, while the R-J is not actually suing anyone who merely links to their work, I feel it might be smart to note that the paper's Righthaven campaign doesn't just cover the stolen written word. The R-J's graphic artist, Mike Johnson, created a great illustration that has been lifted wholesale by RawVegas.TV, Gizmodo.Com, HospitalityNet.Org and many others, see. It's vaguely possible they asked for permission, but the R-J has said that stuff that is used with permission should be labeled as, uh, "used with permission."

Gizmodo in particular is a huge site. They're the ones, recall, who "found" the iPhone4 in a bar earlier this year. And, as Review-Journal attorney Mark Hinueber noted at a Society of Professional Journalists event on Saturday, they operate in the Internet space and ought to know better.

So what's that I smell along with the singed hair at Vdara? Ahh, right. Here come another set of Righthaven lawsuits.

A Very Vegetarian Birthday Party

This...

...is what 85 looks like. Also, it's what my version of this

...turned out like. That's the version shown on SmittenKitchen.Com, where I found and the recipe for the Chocolate Peanut Butter Cake. Yes, mine was a bit different, but that's because I couldn't replicate the evenness of the three layers of cake and ended up using the chocolate-peanut butter glaze to cover up my circumferential errors. (Also, I put the peanut brittle on, which the SK folks did not for the photo.)

Not that it mattered because this...

...looked great and tasted even better. Mmm. Highly recommended. Have some Lipitor handy, though.

As I had Tweeted, it was Walt's 85th birthday this weekend, so I had him, his partner and one of his close friends over for dinner. (Who's Walt? See here.) Walt is a vegetarian, so I studied up in Vegetarian Times and made a four-course meal that started with a homemade green chile hummus that seemed to have broken my blender but tasted delicious. Boo. I also learned -- and this gives you some idea how new I am at this sort of thing -- that garbanzo beans = chickpeas. I spent a long time in the beans aisle before that dawned on me and I checked the Web for confirmation. Duh.

For salad, I did a raw kale salad with root vegetables which was supposed to look like this:

It looked like this...

...which is reasonably close. It was fresh and tasty, with grated turnip and rudabega, among other items. Vegetarian Times doesn't seem to make it easy to find or link to recipes from its current issues, but this is from the October issue and I'm happy to share the recipe privately if anyone asks.

On this course, my only real fudge was on the whole roasted/seasoned pecans because there were perfectly delicious roasted/seasoned pecans available for a lot less than buying fresh pecans and all the ingredients to make my own. Also, I may have gotten the wrong style of kale because mine was much more Afro-ish and not given to being cut chiffonade, one of my new words.

For our main course, I did the vegetable ragout in acorn squashes as well as a farfalle with tomato-goat cheese cream sauce. The squash was pretty labor-intensive -- soaking apricots and prunes a day in advance, chopping all those veggies, making the stew and then stuffing and baking the squash. This is what it was supposed to look like:

Here's how well it went:

I learned two things from this. (a) Farfalle is a fancy word for "bowtie" and (b) I deduced on my own that I'd have to cut the bottom of the squash in order to not have it tip over in the oven. It was a good call, but I was glad to have had a sixth squash to practice on because that first attempt didn't go so well.

Then came dessert. Mmmm. Let's look at that again:

I swear, I wouldn't even think about trying these things if not for "Top Chef." Like, here's my version of mis en place:

Miles made it home for about a half-hour of the meal before he had to return to work, so I managed to get the whole place looking pretty spiffy before the poor soul got in after midnight:

The whole endeavor was a lot of fun. Miles had framed this photo that Emily took of me in front of Walt's childhood home in Beatrice, Neb., when we were on the Great Petcast Roadtrip last month, and that led Walt to tell all sorts of tales of the people in his old neighborhood and all that. A lovely little trigger down memory lane, indeed.

You know who else had a good time, speaking of pets?

Yes, I let Black and Jack lick the peanut butter frosting residue off the mixer thingies. (There's a word for that, right?) Don't worry, Emily, they didn't get any chocolate.

The rest of us did, though. Mmm.