Independence Poker Day

LAS VEGAS–So wow, what a night it\’s shaping up to be … with 49 players left, Jeff Lisandro is the chip leader, and Tom is second in chips.

I\’m not at the Rio right now, am instead sitting solo on my rooftop at Mountains Edge. It\’s supposedly 105 degrees right now, but I swear it doesn\’t feel warmer than 90. The sky is perfectly clear and the stars are bright. And as I follow the WSOP\’s $5,000 No Limit 2-7 Draw w/ Rebuys — Player of the Year on the line — I am encircled by the colorful snap, crackle, and boom of pyrotechnics. Anywhere I look — whether toward the Strip, over Green Valley, behind me in the mountains, North Las Vegas, and even eye-level from one house ever — there are fireworks going off. I can\’t do the 360-degree panorama justice with my photographic skills and camera equipment, but I can tell you this is really cool. A second hasn\’t passed in the last hour without a sparkle in the sky — some from big fireworks shows, some from big spenders at the roadside stands, and others just shooting off the small things out their windows.

Amazing to think of the thousands inside the Rio (and other casinos for that matter) who haven\’t a clue about the brilliance going on all around them. What a celebration of all that is right in Poker America.

UPDATE: Huck Seed has been eliminated. So glad I dropped him from my fantasy team instead of Tom. Change100 is no longer the reporter on duty for PokerNews. That means I no longer have a Tom-pimping connection with the official information provider. Ooh, just saw a really cool blue sparkler, followed by crazy screamers! The sky is really pretty all across the Las Vegas Valley.