Wednesday, December 29, 2004

My brain quit functioning about four hours ago. My body feels like a freight train ran over it, the last rail flipped up and tossed me in front of the freight train and it derailed on top of me. In other words, my butt is dragging. Typical to the Christmas/New Years holidays – we were swamped. People kept milling through the door long into the night and along about 2:30 a.m., one game broke down. It was noise, deal, people, deal, confusion, deal – damn it – deal, on and on into the eternity of a never ending poker game.

Mercifully I found the time clock and the escape hatch at 3:00 a.m. – only to run into a harsh wind, coming straight out of the North Pole, that is colder than a well digger’s ass. I had to make a stop at a store and after arriving at home, safely tucked inside, I remembered I’d left something in the truck. That wouldn’t be such a serious problem if the truck was in its normal place in the garage…concrete acid staining and design has forced me to park street side. So there I was, after a grueling day at the office, in the dark at 4:30 a.m., trudging out into the windblown neighborhood, freezing my tush off, to get what I’d forgotten almost an hour earlier. Jesus! Did I ever mention how much I hate the wind…especially when it’s cold outside? It’s a childhood thing and goes back to living in Wyoming, Kansas, and a few other states where the wind rips through you with icy fingers. I hate the wind.

On the poker side of life, the night evolved into one long poker game. Nothing catastrophic or mind breaking happened, just lots of action and jamming in all the games. I missed all the high limit games except one, $100-$200 Holdem and Sam G. was playing in it. The game is played with $25 chips and it played like a $4-8 game. Sam was, of course, his own entertainment and hero. It was a must move game and he stated something like this, “I’m next to move and I hate to go since you-all are playing like you’ve never played before.”

He ended up being moved by the Brush Person because he was walking when his seat opened in the main game.

A couple of my friends are back in town and they chortle over every morsel of ‘the Sam G. tales’. They feed on his insanity and the way he always finds a way to get into a game. It is pretty incredible. One of them stated that for being a broke railbird, Sam plays in the highest limits in town. Amen. That he does.

While I was dealing a $10-20 blind NLH game the night before, Sam walked up and started finessing the 9s. Sam Syrup held every word together as he continued to talk – the 9s handed Sam a stack of $100 bills that were behind the 9s’s chips and Sam left for a few minutes. He returned with the bills, handed them back to the 9s, and displayed a stack of $1,000 chips with the statement, “I found something better.”

There are those that laugh at the mere mention of Sam G. – there are those that are in awe of all the ability wasted on trying to hustle a buy-in. Me? I’ve managed to get past wondering about any of it. Watching his personality tends to make me appreciate that side of the poker world. In all worlds, we must have all the facets to make the whole picture. Sam is one of the facets.

Who knows how or where or what? Who cares? Sometimes there just aren’t any answers – just questions. I leave it at that.