While I really want to be a good little vixen and write every day, there’s just too much going on. I’ve turned into the human backhoe, loader, dump truck, and all that heavy duty, totally back breaking type of moronic work that I really love. The last five mornings, about 4 a.m., has found me stopping by an oversized empty lot where excess dirt dumped from housing developments is left to grow weeds until someone decides it’s time to do something with it.
It’s a gold mine for me because one of the dumps is about 30 tons of crushed rock. Yes…you don’t even have to ask…I’m crazy. I’m 56, still hauling, lifting, digging in the dirt, laying block wall, laying concrete, planting vines, trees, and all that wonderful earthy stuff, and some days my poor body wonders if there really is a mind trapped somewhere in my skull…or what the HELL is going on?
I started a yard project three years ago. The first year I religiously hit the bricks every a.m. as soon as it was light enough to see where my feet were going. Remember in Vegas it gets hot as hell so the middle of the day stuff ain’t for this fat cat. I’d dry up and die like a grease ball on concrete you could bake a cake on. Then I went into a two year coma, lots of wine drinking, a project on internet poker that never panned out, and life in general found my yard growing weeds and dry, barren earth.
Boom! I got the bug. I found the gold mine, the crushed rock, and away I went. I’m a runaway when I get my nose into something. So…what the hell has this got to do with poker? A lot actually. Sometimes you just have to put your shoulders and your mind into the yoke and just make it happen. The lessons we learn in life are very applicable to poker and how we deal (pardon the pun) with ourselves is the total epitome of where we end up and how we got there.
Ok, I’ll stop with the psychology of it all and get into the world.
*****
I had another session with Marty C., the ‘she’s a curse, a witch!’ guy that just never gives me credit for a win but I always plan his losses. When he wasn’t even in a hand and the player next to him lost, Marty said, “The pot is starting to boil.”
Guess it’s that witch thing again. I thought about saying, ‘the whine is starting to brew.’ Worst of it is that no one except him or me would catch it but the next time he makes a comment like that, I believe I will say the ‘whine’ thing.
He’s such a dumb butt. When he wins a pot, which he did, he always exclaims, “Miracle on 34th Street!” as if God gave a damn whether Marty wins a pot or not. And does he ever say, “Hey, the curse is lifted.” or “The witch made a mistake!” as if God ordained that I should deal him a win? No! He never gives me credit for his wins. Dumb butt!
*****
$15-$30 Holdem. The game next to mine breaks. It’s $8-$16. I have two seats open and a player from the $8-$16 stands up, looks at my game, and asks if I have a seat open. “Sure, come on over. Rock and roll, baby!”
I call, “Player in!” so my brush knows that I’m filling a seat…acknowledged…the new player’s in the Big Blind. He says he’ll take it. My brush goes to get chips for the new player and he has an odd amount like, $239 in cash and some $1 chips from the other game. My brush takes a $1 chip and makes it $240 even.
The bet is raised pre-flop. The new player calls and I mark up the amount he owes with $30 from the pot. The flop comes, he checks, another player bets, call, call, and in the meantime, the new player receives his chips. I said, “You owe $30 to the pot and the bet is $30 to you.”
He was totally drunk on his ass, one of the reasons that I wanted to make sure he knew what was going on with the pot, don’t worry…he went off on me like the fireworks display in Vegas on the 4th of July.
“I know what it is to me. I’m not a moron you know. You don’t have to explain it to me.”
Me, “Just trying to be helpful.”
“You don’t have to tell me what’s going on, I know.”
Me, “I apologize. Just wanted to you to know where and what the bet was.”
He lambasted me with all salvos and I never said another word. I wanted to tell him to stuff it but there’s no win with someone like him…and he’s the live one. I knew it when he stood up and asked if I had a seat.
He lost a pot and got called for another $8-$16 and left my game.
One of the players in my game had a fit after the Rude Dude left…about how rude ‘that player’ was to me. Cute! But that’s the way it is.
Of course I got to deal to Rude Dude again. I sat down in a $4-$8 Holdem game, Rude Dude was in the 10s with a ‘missed blind’ button in front of him, the button was in the 2s, I dealt the hand, started the next hand and Rude Dude asked, “Aren’t you going to ask me if I want to be dealt in?”
“No!”
“Aren’t you supposed to?”
“No!”
He had a little spiel with the guy next to him about my actions and why I didn’t ask him.
Finally I said, “If you sat down after I started dealing, I would ask you. You were already seated and had been here when the previous dealer was dealing. I would assume you didn’t want a hand.”
He took off with something like this, “I’m not trying to be a smart ass, I thought you were supposed to ask me if I wanted a hand.”
Yeah…of course he doesn’t remember the, ‘I’m not a moron’, speech he gave me from the other game but I do.
When pigs fly and you’ve had your fingers and mouth slapped for bad manners, I’ll ask you.