Greetings all! I'm Wilson Gee and I've been a lurker for a long time on the board. After meeting some of you at the CC>CC convention, I finally decided to speak up. Plus I didn't want to butt into any threads without at least introducing myself. I'm a relatively new CC>CC member (R-5555), I joined the Silver Strikers chapter at the convention (SS-542), and I will officially join the Midwest chapter at our next meeting in August.

I seriously started collecting only about a year ago. Unfortunately, I still haven't developed a focus yet, so I have amassed quite an accumulation of chips, tokens, silver strikes, jetons, plaques, slot cards, room keys, matchbooks, bungee cords, pens and one swizzle stick (from Quark's Bar in the Las Vegas Hilton; I'm a sci-fi nut, too).

The bulk of my collection was built from bidding on JackpotAuctions. Not only did I win a lot of chips and strikes, I won a couple of cool prizes from the nice folks at Jackpot, including two sets of all the current Hard Rock roulettes, a copper rim Caesars Palace trumpeter, a near complete set of Sahara plaques (ooh, I want that red $1000!), and over $2K in prize money! Not bad for a newbie.

**The rest of message is just about my trip to Vegas and is kind of long; feel free to skip it**

My trip to Vegas for the convetion was a Christmas gift from Ron Clewell and his wife, Krisan. Ron is one of the best friends a person could have. Going to Vegas without an experienced guide like him would have been waaaay too overwhelming! Once we arrived, we met up with my other best friend, Brian Watts. I must say, it was one of the best times I have ever had in my life; chip, strike and slot card running around Vegas with my two buddies. Man, it was fun!

I met a lot a nice people in and around the convention, but none nicer than Brian Bishop and his wife Joyce. We met while standing at the front of the line waiting for our convention packets. They had a car and were planning to hit all the casinos that had convention chips and offered Ron and I a ride. How could we say no? It was like being taken on a casino field trip. Not only did we get all the available convention chips, the Bishops were patient enough to let us go go through many, many racks of chips at the Fiesta. We even met John James, the GM there. The trip even included a quick jaunt through the Gamblers General Store and see what a gambling grocery store looks like. After finally returning to the Tropicana almost 6 hours later, they wouldn't accept anything from us. We eventually gave them a $25 Harrah's silver token from us, but I'm still looking for another thank you memento for them.

I also played in the poker tournament. It was my first poker tournament (live or online), the first time I had ever played Texas Hold'em on a real table, and I didn't want to play too long because Ron didn't sign up and was waiting for me downstairs. I ended up playing until 1am and won 3rd place! Thanks to Brian for teaching me the strategy I used to win, and thanks to Ron for instilling into me the will to win! $818 ain't bad for a rookie!

I was able to make it to the ChipBoard Get-Together at the Pink Taco and sat facing Pete Sanders, which later turned into a case of deja vu because I ended up playing against him in the poker tournament, in which he won 2nd place. We also sat with Travis Lewin. Two very nice guys, even though they are lawyers. :) Thanks again to Greg for the commemorative chip. I'm just sorry I didn't get one of Archie Black's chips. Maybe next year.

Well, if you're still here, thanks for reading, and thanks to Greg Susong for running a great website and forum. I look forward to speaking more to you all on the ChipBoard.

Wilson
R-5555
SS-542