The World Series Main Event is now per week away. Ordinarily that might make about now the time after I get office based work wrapped up and a bag packed in preparation for a two week trip to report at the closing stages of the WSOP.

But this summer, for the primary time in ten years, I won't be in Las Vegas. My family, used to waving me off, has earned a summer break with me at home, appearing every day in person instead of on Skype. 

But while the possibility of swapping poker men in Las Vegas with games of Pokémon with my son at home feels pretty good right now, I HAVE NOT been capable of entirely shake off thoughts of what I'll miss. Cold turkey for the Vegas fan isn't easy, particularly when over ten years you've grown used to having it served to you on wheat, with American cheese, and a Keno ticket. 

So while my colleagues Brad Willis and Howard Swains might be in country to bring all of the action, I'll use the British summer to place out of mind a few of those things I'll miss.

There's the smell, which hovers somewhere between the categories of food rich in saturated fat and powerful detergent. But in addition the sound, the unmistakable lullaby of the casino floor and the tide of riffled chips from one end of every tournament room to the other. 

I'll miss asking myself--for the fifth and sixth time--whether the poker kitchen burrito is a more healthy choice than the poker kitchen tacos. 

I'll miss the blast of impossible heat as you step out of the service entrance of the Rio and into the carpark, heat that turns a dismal haired man right into a mess and a red haired man into dust. 

I'll miss the Brooks Brothers sale on the Forum in Caesars, the Cadillac margaritas at Bonito Michoacán, the inevitable defeat after half an hour on the Gold Coast Pai Gow table; after which there's that yearly reminder--as life-saving is it's disappointing--that in general I'm a dreadful poker player.  

But then there's the job itself.

That always starts with the long walk along the exhibition centre, past the children happily tapping the glass of the Buzio's lobster tank; past the Starbucks filling station and down towards the atrium selling souvenirs to the defeated; then straight ahead into the Pavilion Room, that cavernous overspill hanger running at permanent full speed.

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It gets second billing to its Amazonian cousin, but while there's great joy to peer it full, in turn there comes melancholy when, midway throughout the Main Event, its tables start to be packed up, loaded onto articulated trailers by workmen in overalls desperate to make room for a name-badged middle management conference of slots players who won't ever take into account that their muffin tray is perched upon hallowed ground. 

Out of the Pavilion and passed the Brasilia Room for your right, and now you're right into a great current of poker players making their way towards their seat. 

Time this wrong, like during a tournament break for instance, and a five minute walk will take your 3 times that as you are attempting to swim upstream. But here you're together with your people, whether they're familiar faces from the feature tables of the EPT, the yankee guys in shorts and armed forces caps desperate to make friends, or the more youthful wannabes in sports gear, living on what's of their pockets.  I can't remember any in their faces, but weirdly I DO KNOW what they give the impression of being like. 

The people I KNOW are within the press room, familiar faces all, and last seen one short year ago. The similar goes for the tournament staff, never more primed than through the bubble, as I wrote last year, which individuals like me are permitted to absorb with glorious access; the precise to stroll some of the tables, to listen to the staccato instructions of the ground staff, and notice everything closer than even the players, right until the tournament clock stops at nine. 

 

All of so as to pass me by as I relax, feet up and 8 hours ahead, endlessly pressing "Refresh" at the PokerStars Blog. 

Because whilst you and that i may not be there this year, the PokerStars Blog coverage guarantees you do not really need to be, publishing the most efficient writing from Las Vegas at some point of the sector Series of Poker Main Event. 

All of that's now just a bit greater than per week away. Enough time to search out a fair burrito recipe, maybe some detergent for atmosphere, and make amends for the entire big WSOP stories thus far on our coverage pages. 

It used to be said that a bit of Las Vegas goes a ways. And it does. But I'll miss the place.

WSOP Photos by PokerPhotoArchive.com

Stephen Bartley is a staff writer for the PokerStars Blog.

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