*** TJ's 2024 WSOP Trip! ...That Might Turn Into A Move?

Like I said, Vegas is a world-class food city if you know where to look, and some of the best places are off the strip. I have some favorite places I like to go, and some new places I’d like to try. If you have some food recs, I’m always listening! In no particular order, here are my favorite spots, some of which may see a repeat visit this trip:

-Delmonico (Nice steakhouse at Venetian… ELITE creamed spinach)
-Bouchon (French bistro, best brunch spot in town)
-Yardbird (Best fried chicken)
-Lotus of Siam (Best Thai)
-Hobak (Best Korean Barbecue)
-Esther’s Kitchen (Great Italian joint)
-Soul Belly (Great BBQ, try the burnt ends)
-Ping Pang Pong (Best dim sum Chinese in town)
-El Dorado Cantina (Best Mexican)
-Honey Salt (American comfort food, #1 restaurant on the LV Eater food blog, but it’s way tf out in Summerlin)
-Tacos El Gordo (Best Mexican street food)
-Giordano’s (Chicago deep dish pizza chain)
-Yukon Pizza (Great pizza and burgers)
-Peppermill’s (Kitschy, iconic Vegas diner, with HUGE portions. Sadly not 24 hours anymore.)

Here are some places I haven’t been that I’d like to try this trip:

-Golden Steer (Downtown steakhouse)
-Shang Artisan Noodles (I owe it to ya, @fatboy8!)
-Main Street Provisions (LEGENDARY Brunch, I’m told)
-Carson Kitchen
-Everyone in this forum, for or against, is talking about Mother Wolf. I might just have to check it out at Fountainebleu, to see what it’s all about.

One thing nobody tells you about adulthood is how challenging it is to figure out what you want to eat every single night before you die. My goal with a list like this is that I can quickly reference and try something no matter what kind of mood I’m in. By necessity, being around casinos all the time, I’ll sometimes grab something that’s convenient, even if it’s a tad overpriced. I’m looking forward to checking out the food court at Aria, as I haven’t been since they closed the buffet.

Of course, many thanks to the regulars of the Casual Dining Thread over the years, who have done great work coming up with the inspiration for both of these lists!

Like many of you, Black Friday caught me unprepared back in 2011, and I didn’t know what I wanted to do when the viability of online poker went away. I drifted for several years, working wherever I could find as a restaurant server, karaoke DJ, and even tried sales as a mortgage broker. Nothing fit, and none of it was a long-term career. So at 32, I made the best professional decision I’ve ever made, and went back to school for nursing, to finish my degree.

I graduated nursing school in 2018, and I couldn’t be happier with my career and what I do. I truly believe I’ve found my calling. It’s a noble vocation that helps people, with real benefits, in a recession-proof industry. Above all, it’s a mobile career. I’ll always be in demand, and safe from automation. I can work as much or as little as I want, anywhere I’d ever want to live.

I spent my first 4 years on nights in the hospital, first in acute care med/surg, and then later, in the emergency room. Being in the ER at the height of Covid was a great experience, and I learned a ton… but, at times, it got a little intense. So I made a change, and for the last two years, I’ve been working at an outpatient hemodialysis clinic. It’s a niche in health care that I’ve really taken to, and it’s been a great fit for me.

Kidney failure patients are a highly specialized patient class, and growing as the demographic trends age. Staffing is an unsolvable problem everywhere in the healthcare industry, but especially so in dialysis. Unlike EVERY hospital everywhere, dialysis employers prefer NOT to recruit new grad nurses, because dialysis nurses need practical experience assessing patients first. You have to be able to tell from across the room what people look like when their blood pressure is tanking.

Dialysis as an industry is effectively a duopoly, dominated by two big players. Fresenius and DaVita are both global companies, with a presence in the developed world, everywhere there’s people. Between the two of them, they control 71% of dialysis clinics in the US. The rest are independent clinics run by insurance companies or hospital systems, and even those are actively divesting to one giant or the other practically every day, as it becomes unprofitable to operate without scale.

Without saying which, (hi mods!) I work for one of the two big dialysis employers. And obviously, they both have plenty of clinics all over Las Vegas.

I think to myself, I work all year to save money and PTO for my big trip to Vegas for WSOP every summer, so I can finally feel ALIVE again. Why not just move there? I’m not married, no kids (that I know of), and nothing tying me down… here or anywhere else. My mom and sister each live here in North Carolina, and they’re doing fine.

So while I’m in town, I’m going to bring my resume, show up at some clinics in Summerlin, and ask the clinic managers how’s their staffing. If I do that enough, I’m confident my resume will make its way to the desk of the regional ops director, who should be very interested to talk with me. As a nurse that’s already been with the company for two years, they might even be willing to discuss a relocation package to get me there.

…Which is good, because my next stop will be at various apartment communities in Summerlin, to see where I’d want to live… hypothetically, of course, if an offer is forthcoming.

I’ve already poked around U-Haul’s website. To rent a truck in North Carolina, tow my car across the country, and return the truck in Las Vegas, this can be done for about $2,300, plus whatever gas for the trip costs. I’d need a couple nights in a motel on the road in flyover country. A few hundred bucks for moving help here and there, plus a security deposit and associated costs with getting a new place, and I’m thinking a cross country move would cost in the ballpark of $5-6k.

Of course, all this becomes much simpler if I can come up with a nice tourney score on this trip! That’s the outcome I’m rooting for the most, for LOTS of reasons. Or maybe I can get the new clinic to pay my relocation costs. I did receive a competitive sign on bonus when I was first hired, paid out over my first year.

Everything that I’ve read about professional development says that to maximize your compensation, it’s important to do a market check, and find out what you’re worth every few years. Then you either need to be prepared to leave, or leverage outside offers to get more to stay. After my sign on bonus got paid out, I received one small raise to keep up with inflation… but I’m basically being paid the same rate I got when I first started, when I had zero dialysis experience. I’m a materially and marketably different nurse now, with experience in this highly specialized field. I’d also be moving to a higher cost of living area. …Now I’m quite curious to see how big the number could be, if they make me an offer!

Is this my mid-life crisis? Maybe. But a mid-life crisis can be a lot of fun! I liken it more to Forrest Gump, running across the country. He didn’t know what he was searching for, but it was the act of going on the journey that let him know when he found it.

My lease in North Carolina is up in September. I’m not able to buy a house yet, and I don’t want to renew, given the pace of rental increases I’ve seen since I’ve lived here. So, here’s to following dreams, going on an adventure, and living life without regrets!

And so it begins! LOTS to look forward to this trip, both recreationally and professionally.

The poker bankroll for cash and tournaments will start at 9k. If that goes busto over my 18 days, I’ll have access to more… so it’s not a liferoll, but we’re hoping that won’t be necessary.

I won’t have a car, so I’m budgeting 2.5k for food and Uber, which is separate from the poker bankroll. The flight and Airbnb are already paid for.

I’ll have an upcoming EIGHT 12’s for work over the next ten days, plus a DJing gig, which I’m sure will just BREEZE right by! I’m starting this thread now, to keep up the motivation to get through this stretch, focused on the goal.

Then we’re wheels up next Friday morning!

First off, I am IN.

Secondly, good luck with the potential move prospects.

Thirdly, I like the schedule. I think you'll find more breathing room in these WSOP events compared to the 30 minute stuff last year. The slower events will give you more time to leverage your edge. At some point you will still need to make some hands, but you'll have a lot more wiggle room before shove-bot mode activates. If I can give a quick word of advice on the Monster Stack, that tournament is crazy slow/deep. I bagged barely above starting last year and it was still a playable stack for day 2. Slow and steady is a good mindset for that one.

If they offer, ask if they can help with relocation expenses.

Did you cash? I bagged a small stack the first time I played it, but on Day 2, like the second hand I got was AK, so had to go with it.

Yea, I won a few pots early day 2 and then just basically folded into the min-cash (card dead).

I am really excited for you after reading this post. I’m about 15 years your senior, married, kids, career, mortgage, blah, blah, blah. It’s a wonderful life, of course, but we all long at times for the kind of freedom you have created yourself. So take advantage of it!

Perhaps you’ll relocate and realize that it truly was just a mid-life crisis, or that part of the magic of your annual trip to Vegas was tied up in its scarcity, its once-a-yearness.…in which case you can simply pack your car back up and return to North Carolina and your mom and sister. All of that will still be there for you. There is nothing keeping you where you are in your life. This entire situation is a freeroll and I’m thrilled for you that you will be firing it. I wish I’d done much of the same when I’d had my opportunities.

Good luck on this trip, on the tables and away from them. I’ll be following along!

Best of luck. Safe travels
Sub’d

Always in for a TJ TR!

Best of luck with the job prospects too. If you do move, and your route takes you through Denver, feel free to give me a shout.

Good luck with the poker and the job prospects. What eventually pushed me into not moving was that I drove around the area and realized I would be miserable being surrounded by dirt where I lived.

Subbed. Good luck on poker and life. I’ll be there 18th-23rd. Mainly cash games but sprinkle a low buyin tourney or two.

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Tj,
Best of luck pokerwise and with the possible move.
Racetrack

Subbed. Gl gl!

Good luck.

Echoing everyone's best wishes for poker run good and an offer. Your call on whether to accept.

I'll be out there 17-28 JUN, so we'll overlap. Let me know if you wanna hook up for a beer/adult beverage. Staying at the Flamingo (best rate for Caesar's center-strip property), so Promenade would be convenient. FYI, my lady-friend (we're both too old to call her "girlfriend") is a public health nurse for the local county.

re the relocation. Talk to all the other companies out there and see what happens. Whether you get an offer or not, then go to your employer on your return and use those conversations as leverage to get them to offer you a role and re-locate you.

there's a whole art to it that I can go into via PM if required (I run a headhunting firm and have/see this discussion all the time)

Have fun check-raising those stupid tourists!

The summer isn't over yet. You might change your mind.

mate, I think about it constantly. But I’m going with my son on a rugby tour in early July for 6 days and I can’t justify any more time away from my business. And I’m getting divorced later this year and have a ton of stuff to grind through. And living in Australia, it’s really a 10 day commitment to make a Vegas trip worthwhile

Small chance I might do a solo trip in Oct/Nov but far more likely I’ll do something this time next year

TJ,

I'm most def in. Can't wait to follow along!!

Yeah, with all that going on, plan and save for next year.

4 shifts down, 4 more to go!

Thanks for the kind words and support, everyone.