It turned out to be a special invitation all right, probably sent to thousands of other special people, asking me to be "his personal guest to hear the real Trump story on wealth creation."  The only problem was 'The Donald' would not to be there, but Ivanka, his daughter, would be and she wanted me to be HER special guest. She wanted to teach me how to 'Think Big. Live Large!" Heck, I have been doing that for years living large by overspending. I didn't need to spend a whole day at Cook Convention Center, even if the lunch was comped, listening to daddy's little girl trying to sell me something I didn't want.  Seeing The Donald's fine hand in all this, I noted that one segment of the seminar was "Protect 100% of your personal assets from all lawsuits, liens, levies, bankruptcy, or even divorce." I guess his former wife, Ivana, must have read it before he did.

About time a casino held a blackjack tournament, open to the public, in Tunica. If you are a good player you have got to try tournament action where the moves are not in the book but off the table. The $99 buy-in for Fitz' Big Stack tournament is a low number but also low is the number of entries allowed. Only 108 players will be accepted in Fitz' $25,000 tournament on Jan. 26-28 so get your money up soonest as this baby will fill up fast. First prize if $10,000 followed by $6,000 for second place with prizes also for places 3-7 on the final table.  See your casino host to register.  We've mentioned in passing in this column about the renovation going on at Fitz'. The first phase is now completed and all the currently scheduled renovations on the second phase should be competed about April.

Casino City Gaming, where you can read all the current industry news you want on casinocitytimes.com, picked as its number one gaming story of 2006 the congressional ban on Internet gambling. You should know, however, the law does not actually ban such gambling but it does prohibit banks and other financial institutions from processing transactions to Internet gaming companies. Wish they had stopped my wager on Ohio State. Was that a disaster or what? SEC proved again why it is the toughest football conference in the land.

Every year Grand Casino holds a media tournament just before the WSOP Circuit event kicks off there and this year it set a record for attendees with 53 media folks showing up for the fun and the great list of prizes. Old pal, Tom Prestigiacomo, DJ for FM100 hit two great cards on the river in the final minutes of his duel with GoodTimes Radio co-host, Daniel Martinez, and won a trip to Paris Casino in Vegas, as well as two tickets to the hit show, The Producers," plus a beautiful WSOP leather jacket. 'Danny Z' had to settle for the second place prize of a trip to the Rio in Vegas. Colleague David Grisham, editor of Jackpot, who won the event last year, showed up again with a 5th place finish and won a trip to the Grand Biloxi. I went  "all in" once too many times and watched from the sidelines. But I will get another shot in Goldstrike's World Poker Open media event on Jan. 20. It was pretty good to me last year.

Lisa Lampanelli is scheduled to bring her no-holds barred, stand-up comedy to Sam's Town on Feb. 23  but before then we hope to have you sample her laugh-in on the GoodTimes Radio Show on WMC 790 some Saturday morning before her appearance.  Lisa is no wannabe in the comedy field as she is a regular on Jay Leno's 'Tonight' show and is a staple on Comedy Central roasts. Stay tuned between 8:30 and 10:30 on  GoodTimes, the only casino gaming show around these here parts. And 'Kansas', one of the Seventies great arena rock bands brings its power-anthem sound to the Sam's River Palace Entertainment Center on March 3rd.

And last, and possibly least, an hilarious story from Down Under. Fleas are infesting the carpets at New Zealand's Sky City casino so all the dealers are wearing flea collars around their ankles. But how do they scratch when they are not permitted to reach under  the table.

LAISSEZ LE BON TEMPS ROULER.