Amazing how one table makes the difference in your whole night…not in the form of tipping…but opens your eyes to a side of people that you’d rather not see. Yes, details to follow:

For the last few weeks, I’ve been in the kind of ‘dealer land’ that all dealers wish they could stay in forever. No one threw cards at me or glared or swore or had anything to say other than, “Hey that’s poker!” or “Nice hand!” or something that implied they were there to have fun and weren’t going to die or sleep in the street if they didn’t win a pot.

Lately I’ve dealt to people that just came to play. One night I pushed into a $4-$8 Holdem game and three of the players had just sat down and not taken a hand yet. The 1s was one of them and I found out his name was Kenny. He was w-a-s-t-e-d! As in drink, drank, drunk and the bar was empty. His eyes were trying to focus and his mind wouldn’t let them but he was there to play. Every time he looked at his cards, he leaned clear into my arm with his head and I had to brace myself to keep from falling over…Kenny was a good sized lad.

I got a huge kick out of him and his friends and the whole table for that matter. Kenny thought he had to play every hand if he wanted to ‘be in the game’. I believe he thought he had to leave if he didn’t play every hand. He flopped a flush draw once, the board paired on the Turn, he made a straight on the River as there was a four card straight on board and he didn’t even see it. Lucky for him because the other player turned a full house.

Yes, I saw every hand Kenny held. I finally convinced him that he could fold if he wanted to and didn’t have to stay in…then he would ask me after he folded, if he’d done the right thing. I answered him honestly. Yet he still never figured out what the ‘burn’ cards were, or why the button was there, or anything else before I left. He was gracious and fun, spunky and belligerent, having fun and drunk…if all that makes sense. I even checked back on the table a few hours later to see how everyone was doing…they were still jamming. Love it!

Then I had the fun of everyone being ‘in love’ with me…or pretending to be. The query from a 25 year old, “You’re 26 aren’t you? What are you doing when you get off work?”

Or, “Linda, you truly are Linda.” Yes children, I’ve been told a thousand times that Linda means beautiful in Spanish. This sweet heart was giving me the ultimate compliment.

Then a table full of guys, in which the 3s, around 60ish, said, “Linda! You are beautiful, I wish I could have seen you when you were young.”

I slapped the table and retorted, “I’m young now, damn it!”

Everyone laughed, the 2s said I looked just fine the way I was and the 1s said he was jealous.

The 3s managed to explain, with the help of all the other guys, that he really wished he’d met me when he was younger.

It was fun but let’s get back to tonight.

I went through the whole night, easy dealing, games were lively, boisterous players and lots of action…then the ‘nuisance break’ and up to table one for my last down. $400-$800 Mixed Games. Eli E.- 1s, Lee – 5s, O’Neil – 7s, and Cuckoo – 8s.

First Lee glared and stared at me because he lost a hand. Then Eli grabbed the deck and scrambled it in a wide circle when he lost a hand. He left it, spread out over the 1, 2, 3s area and I said, “You have to pull it together and straighten it out.”

He ignored me.

Then Cuckoo…God Almighty Cuckoo lost a few hands and went into ‘mother fucker, fucking fucker’, repeat, skip, repeat, skip, repeat. He tried to throw the cards through the rack. I had my hands up.
The second hand he lost, he tried to mate/merge his cards with the rack. I had my hands up again. He missed me both times and it was bothering him a lot that I was too smart/quick for him so the third hand, he just threw his cards across the table. He did the, ‘mother fucking, fucking fucker’ thing, until I left the box.

I never looked at any of the players, never changed my attitude or stance…just wondered how in the hell I could end up in the ‘twilight zone’ of poker after having spent two weeks in prime ‘dealer land’ and enjoying it.

Oh sure, you hear this all the time, “He used to be a dealer.” Well in truth, Cuckoo told that same tale about himself not too long ago. So where is he coming from? Don’t bother trying to answer that one…he lives in his own hell or he wouldn’t be where he is, behaving as he does.

*****
I was part of this project. Sweet!
Howard Lederer’s ‘Secrets of No Limit Holdem’