I came home from work tonight thinking I would go crazy if I had to go back and deal one more night to these PEOPLE! It’s close to eight weeks of tournament, high limit, tournament aftermath – explained like this, they spent so much playing satellites and tournaments that they are scraping to play live action and trying to get some of their money back before they head for home, it’s nonstop noise, heat, understaffed in the room, over staffed in the player arena, and IT’S MAKING ME CRAZY.

There is no place that feels like the good old poker room, no table, no starting line-up, no damn nothing to hang onto that resembles the room and players that I’ve come accept as my family and home. Sob, tears, anguish, and hand wringing are going on right now in my thoughts.

Then, miraculously, after 3 glasses of wine, the whole scene became funny. This is how it should be written…maybe you’d better get through a couple of glasses of wine so you can see the humor in it too.

· I slide into the dealer’s seat in a high limit game and announce, “Players, start your whine! Remember, no eye gouging, name calling, throwing projectiles at anyone, or spitting, and may the best whiner win!”

· When a high limit player tips Carmen a green bird and says, “I’d better tip you ’cause no dealer’s gonna push me a pot so I can tip them.”

I get to reply, “Heard there’s a spot open under the Sahara Street overpass if you need a place to sleep.”

or “Tipping is an option, being stupid isn’t.”

· A player asks for a setup. There’s a new deck in the well, I bring it out, spread it, scramble it face up, turn it over and scramble it face down, shuffle up and deal. During the hand, the player cries because he asked you for a setup and you aren’t doing your job. I get to reply, “Poker is a group awareness program, Sunshine. Pay attention now, we might have a pop quiz later.”

· When a player calls all the way to the River and makes a hand and another player starts chastising them for playing bad and getting there, I get to say, “Shut the fuck up! Did you come to play or whine?”

· When a player throws cards at me, I get to throw two decks at them.

· When a player says everything was fine before I sat down, I get to say, “I don’t see an anchor chained to your ass!”

· When a player starts talking about dealers and then refers to me as ‘she’ like I was a chair or a napkin, I get to pimp slap* them out of their chair for being rude. *What’s pimp slapping? Beat the hell out of them without leaving any bruises.

· When I have to dodge flying chips and cards, I get to throw a chair at them and say, “Dodge this, asshole!”

· When I’ve called the open seat in my game, screaming it at the top of my lungs, and a player looks at me and asks, “Do they know we have a seat open?”

I get to ask, “Are your ears painted on?”

Wow! This could go on forever so…Sandman land is waiting…and another night of wonderful, heart pounding, live action poker!!! C U there!