As good luck would have it, I had the pleasure of jumping into a game with Larry again. He’s just a ton of fun to play with. It’s possible that if he faded the green felt every day, day in and day out for a few years, he might not be as much fun but at this point, all of my experiences with him at the table have been better than enjoyable. I sat down in the 6s, looked at two hands, the 3s opened and I moved. I like the end seats because I have a better view of the table and sometimes a little more stretch room because I can turn my chair to one side and stretch my legs out for a moment…there’s never enough room at the tables anyway.

Larry was in the 8s and I asked for the 9s if it opened. The game was moderately/intermittently good. Larry put a Straddle on the BB and so did I, but of course we were the only ones doing it. And later as I sat beside him, we both laughed over the fact that no one ever raised our straddles. It’s hard to believe that six people will just auto call $8…DOH! That aside, people came and went, the play went on, and eventually the 10s opened, the 9s moved to the 10, I moved to the 9, the 1s took the seat I left, and the game started to jump.

The 3s, an Asian woman, went on an incredible tear. I laughed over the fact that I left the seat too soon…no…I don’t believe in ‘seats’. I do believe in ‘hot asses’. Years ago in Montana, they told me it wasn’t the chair but the ass in the seat, that’s exactly how I feel about it. She played some pretty bizzaro hands, not that I wouldn’t have played them if I’d been on a rush, no one plays a rush better than me. It’s just that I haven’t found a true rush in so long that I might be a little rusty at raising every pot preflop and on every street because I know I’m going to win the pot.

The room was a little insaniac bunch of screaming poker players. The noise level was brutal, bodies were everywhere, the standby line to “O” (right outside the rail from our table) was 15 miles long, as was the buffet line just a 100 yards down. In general the entire casino was like an ant farm, yet Table 22 was like an island in the eye of a hurricane.

One of Bellagio’s tournament dealers (don’t know his name) was in the 1s for a bit, moved to the 7s so he could watch a game on the overhead TV, then took the 10s, then moved back to the 7s, and was in a war with the 3s. He mumbled about her, she stacked his chips and looked at him as he mumbled. He was convinced that she was giving him dirty looks. I personally felt she was looking at him like he was the smorgasbord of fish delicacies on a planet that had no water.

A new player landed in the 5s. He wasn’t new to me and I’d rather not see him in any game I’m playing in. He’s seasoned, used to play at The Mirage, very seldom every hits Bellagio on my shift, and he’s like a shark circling the waters looking for floating seals…and he’s got attitude.

As the Law of Diminishing Returns went into effect, our Asian beauty in the 3s gradually bled off her chips. At one point she had almost $500 in front of her from a $100 buy-in. When she left she took about $140 with her…unless she was ratholing and I don’t believe that was the case.

Michelle took her seat.

Michelle is a study of complete dysfunctional insanities all blended together by a bartender that wanted to punish society. Israeli and temperamentally angry most of the time, I’ve posted about him before and called the floor on him more than once over the years when I’ve been dealing a game and he is completely out of line…he’s out of line most of the time but sometimes he’s COMPLETELY out of line. This game was no exception. He sat right down to K-K; I had straddled Larry’s BB. I got the last raise in with 4-5 off. Ok…so I’m a sick bitch what do you want? There were seven players taking the Flop and as I put the last raise in, I said, “Let’s make sure the pot is so big I can’t throw my hand away on the flop.”

Larry and I were both laughing, exchanging words like, “yeah…nobody’s figured that out yet.” “yeah…make the pot and then make your hand…” Maybe you would have to have been there but if you don’t understand that everyone’s taking a shot at a flop and some of the players hold high cards, and once you get pot bound…

James was dealing. I’ve had my moments with James. The game slows down to crawl, he has to count the rack at least nine times and while he’s counting, no one knows it’s up to them or the game just runs without James knowing he’s supposed to do something…umnhhh! James was busy stacking all of our blue chips into $20 stacks in the middle of the table. *waiting for a flop* Lots of time to visit with Larry.

The Flop was A-K-Q. For the first time in my history of playing cards, I just threw my hand away. I never do this…I always check and force someone to act and wait for the action to come back to me before folding…not this time. I committed the Worst Move in Poker.

Jarrett was in the 6s by now, he’d started in the 10s next to me. Let me introduce Jarrett, a great looking guy that’s about the same age as my boys, we’ve sat in a few other games and chatted it up as we tried to beat each other’s brains out across the green felt. Jarrett is a VIP host at Palms Playboy Club. Jarrett is always working, even when he’s relaxing in a game of poker, he sends and receives more text messages than anyone I know other than my youngest son, Darian. I figure they will both be having wrist/hand/finger related problems later in life just from sending text messages. Hey, at 1-2K messages a month, it could create serious physical impairment. *laughing*

But in the meantime, back to the action, an all holy hell chip raising flash flood broke out. Michelle was right in the middle of it, glaring demonically at the dealer as raise after raise after raise went in between him, the 5s, Jarrett, and I believe the 2s was involved as a hitchhiker until the last card hit. James just kept stacking up the chips, like it was incredibly important that they all be neatly stacked – IN A $4-8H GAME…WTF? Four bets went in on the river between Michelle, the 4s, and Jarrett. Michelle showed pocket Kings for Kings full of Aces, the 5s showed A-Q for Aces full of Queens, and Jarrett showed A-J for trip Aces.

Michelle was doing the grumble/glare/swear mode at the dealer. I knew Michelle was going to go all-in on the next hand, no matter what he held. I looked down to A-8H in the BB and I knew I was going to help him. Michelle raised, several callers, I raised, the 2s called, Michelle raised, several callers, I raised, the 2s called, I raised, and so it went. Michelle was all-in before the flop. The flop brought A-9-9 all black. I bet, the 2s called, the 4s raised, I raised. The 2s folded and I led the bet on each street with the 4s calling. I didn’t win. The 4s showed A-Q, grumbling every time he called like I was trying to pull one of his teeth with a pair of pliers.

Michelle jumped up with a snarl, telling the dealer to lock the seat up for him, and left in search of ???

The 2s leaned out, clearing the obstruction of the dealer, glared and me, and growled, “NICE RAISE A-8 OF HEARTS! NICE RAISE!”

Steam it up baby. I stared right at him and yelled back (it was noisy in there), “If you don’t like my raises, there’s a transfer list over there, GET ON IT!” WTF! He was mumbling too. Great game.

The 5s now had more stacks of blue chips in front of him than the Cashier’s Cage had in it, but he was his usual charming, ATTITUDE self a few hands later. Larry had straddled, the 5s raised, somewhere in there, as the hand went down, Larry had flopped an open ended straight draw and made the straight on the turn and got paid off on every street by ATTITUDE. ATTITUDE snarled, “Your hand was no good on the flop!” No shit?

About 10 minutes later, I knew Larry had a big hand, just the way the betting went preflop, flop, turn, and on the river? ATTITUDE won the pot. Larry was his usual smiling self as his conversation to me went something like, “Do you think I should have told him his hand was no good on the flop?” *gales of laughter*

I was having a great time even though I hadn’t won a pot in about three weeks. But as all great times must come to an end, I was about ready to hit the door. Larry had been going to leave for an hour, he picked up some racks and was preparing to start loading his chips up when Jarrett said, “Let’s play until midnight, that’s went I’m leaving.”

Larry agreed. Two hands later my blind was due, I racked up. Jarrett and Larry both argued with me, “…stay until midnight…we made a deal.”

I was laughing out loud as I picked up my chips, “You guys made the deal. I didn’t.”

Good night, Jarrett. Good night, Larry. See all the rest of you homies somewhere down the line.