I packed up the night of May 30. Because our upstairs air conditioner broke, I planned to spend the night at our condo, so more of our kids could sleep downstairs where it was a little cooler. I didn’t get to the condo until midnight, and decided to play the 12:30 AM (MST) $50 + $5 MTT. It doesn’t have a guarantee but it draws a bunch of extra people when I play – because I’m red or because I stink? – so it’s fun.

As usual, I busted out in about 15 minutes moaning and groaning about how awful people are who play at this time of night – myself included. I kept working and organizing and the next thing I knew, it was 1:30 AM. I wasn’t tired so I signed up for the last Guarantee tournament of the night, the $24 + $2 buy-in $4,500 Guarantee.

I had played this tournament a few times, with awful results. On most occasions, I had entered it because I was miserable after a night of losing and a quick exit gave me something fresh to rage about as I struggled to fall asleep. When you think about it, when it’s 2 AM in Arizona, there isn’t anyplace on earth where it’s a reasonable time to play poker.

The quality of play is low and so are the spirits of the players. After about an hour, something dawned on me: if I don’t bust out of this soon, I have to stay awake until at least 6 AM. During the first break, I took a 3 AM walk around the neighborhood. I noticed myself nodding off between hands so I decided at the second break to take a little nap on the floor.

Not a good idea. I woke about 20 minutes later, terribly sore, disoriented, and even sleepier than before. A minute later, I realized I had been playing in a poker tournament and scrambled to the computer. I was being blinded and anted off but I had A-Q in the small blind and a short stack in late position had moved all-in. This was a chance to recover all my lost chips and then some.

I quickly pushed “I’m back” and “call”. But my computer froze up. In my semi-coherent state, I tried to fix the computer by screaming at it. It shouldn’t surprise you to learn that this did not work.

By the time I oriented myself to shut down and restart the computer, a whole round had passed and I was under the gun with A-5. It definitely wasn’t a good enough hand to push, but I had about 10 big blinds, I was sleepy, I didn’t know what would happen with my connection, and I just wasn’t thinking smart.

I pushed and would have gotten away with it but the player in the small blind had K-K and called. I lucked out and made a straight to win the pot. What can I say? I made a mistake and got lucky.

Mr. Kings went insane with rage. He proceeded to lose the rest of his chips – he had a big stack before the hand, and still did – in the next several hands, all the while cursing me. And then he stayed up another hour and a half until I busted to tell me one final time how bad I was. It was either the middle of the night or the start of his work day, and this was how he spent it.

After we got in the money, I raised in middle position with As-8s. The big blind pushed all-in. I was getting 2-to-1 so I called. He had 4-4 and I caught an ace. He also started slamming his fists into the keyboard, where they hit a nasty combination of keys. It didn’t help that I busted him with 8-8 against his 7-7 a few hands later. And he complained about how I played THAT hand, even though we each put in a reraise before getting it all in.

His parting words, and I knew he wouldn’t go quietly, surprise me even now.

“Get AIDS.”

At the final table – it was now nearly 6 AM – the first player eliminated as named Thi Annz. I had played with him for much of the tournament and I don’t remember him saying a word. He had K-K and was eliminated by A-Q.

He said to the other player, “you lucky #$%@ go suck some @#$# and die, ill go fist your mom some more”.

Did he think that up on the spot or did he have a cheat sheet with it, ready for use? I suspect the latter because he, too, stuck around to toss around some more unbelievably foul insults.

I finished fifth, breaking my long losing streak on Full Tilt but I can’t say I felt better about myself. It was 6:30 AM, I was giving my first interview for the FULL TILT book in an hour, I had only 20 minutes of sleep, and I was just a few hours from making a 5 hour drive through the desert to the World Series of Poker. Plus I felt like I needed to wash my eyes after some of the things I read.

I finally decided, after much reluctance, to start complaining to Full Tilt about people who are nasty and abusive in chat.

Annie Duke - We saw each other just briefly at Jennifer Harman's charity tournament and the unveiling of her picture in Caesars' poker room, but hadn't really visited since last year's World Series. Back when I was in L.A. every other week interviewing her brother or Chris Ferguson for the Full Tilt book, we would get together so often that Jo Anne would gaze dreamily at pictures of Joe Reitman on the Internet, just to know if I could carry on a fantasy fling, she could too.

Annie was thrilled and excited about the huge ad in USA TODAY for Ante Up for Africa, the tournament she and Don Cheadle are hosting the day before the Main Event. She didn't even notice that the special section devoted to poker had a caricature of her - a very nice one - and a bit saying her nicknames were "The Duke" and "Annie Legend."

I think Annie Duke would punch me if I called her Annie Legend, even for fun.

We made vague plans to get together. "Text me," she said, repeating the message of almost every other poker pro in the house. Professional poker players are high-high-high on the list of the most frequent and agile text messagers.

I was so happy to see Annie that I gave her four hugs, and got at least one in return. I wished her luck during the last one and she whispered in my ear, "I'm a little bit sick."

We all are, babe. That's part of the charm.

Phil Gordon - Phil got MARRIED since the last time I saw him. I'm predicting a big Series for Phil and I told him, in addition to anyone else who will listen. He, too, was thrilled by the ad in USA TODAY's special poker section devoted to his favorite cause, cancer cures. Like Annie, he had high praise for Harrah's efforts to promote his cause. Phil and I also discussed, as commentators on the game, how a lot of outside media would spin the inevitable decline in Main Event numbers into a "poker is dead" sound-bite and what we could do, while being responsible and impartial, to rain (or at least urinate) on their parade.

Pauly - I saw the King of Bloggers, the Mayor of the Tilted Kilt, in the media line. It was the first time in half a year and I was amazed at how Paul looked ... good. I mean, healthy, fit, clean. Not the poster boy for the Seven Deadly Sins that I had grown to love and fear. But he assured me, "It's the 'before' picture."

Johnny Chan walks by, carrying a gold shopping back. There's Liz Lieu, looking gorgeous, yet way too skinny for a healthy human being. Chris Ferguson arrives and is mobbed by poker fans.

Howard Lederer, I learned, is not here for the start of the Series. He is attending his 25-year high school reunion. I e-mail him that I insist he give me the details for this blog. "If you don't," I write, "I'm just going to make it up, and what are you going to do then?"

I finally get out of the Rio at about 1 PM. I had shown up at 9 AM just to sneak in and register. Half my ensemble is pajamas and I haven't bathed or shaved.

I stop by a sandwich shop on the way back and am drawn into a conversation of three people about the quality of food offered casino employees. "Bellagio is best," Jennifer tells me. Jennifer is smokin-hot; I don't catch the names of the two dudes she's with. "After that, Wynn is great. Caesars has good food but they make you eat it in a pit." What's bad? "I think the worst is Riviera. When I worked there, everyone said to stay away from the EDR [employee dining room], including people who served the food. Tropicana is no good, and New York New York? That place is terrible."