I started on Table 28. Connie was in the game, along with Ed, and a few new faces. Connie and Ed are very easy to deal to.

Ed just moved here permanently from Seattle. He’s funny! No matter what he says, it comes across as being funny. He talks almost non-stop. He told us about an ex-roommate, the roommate told Ed he was going to kill him, twice in one month, with a straight face…Ed’s version of it had me laughing out loud.

Ed told me that he should be able to make it to December before going broke and having to look for a job…if he plays really well. Come on! He’s only kidding.

Still there are so many new faces at the tables, most of them have no idea what they’re doing but they are here to play. I love it!

When I hit table 30, $8-$16 Holdem, Spoody came up and introduced himself, a reader and email bud. Nice! He had his lovely wife with him and I got to meet her, over the heads of the players, as she put up with Spoody taking the time to say ‘hi’ and introduce himself.

A break and then up to $1,000-$2,000. Phil I. in the 1s, Jennifer in the 2s, Mike M. in the 4s, Minh in the 6s, and Daniel N. in the 7s. When I tapped out Sylvia, Daniel looked up and said, “They’re all throwing things.”

I replied with a smile, “Great! Did I tell you I thrive on this?”

He laughed.

I dealt the first few hands, Jennifer won a pot, threw me a toke, I said, “Thank you.”
She looked off, across the room, as if she was addressing no one in particular, and said, “Anytime…bitch!”

I started laughing. The guys all looked at me as if they thought I would go nut-z-z-z. Then they laughed too. It’s a thing I have with Jennifer. Maybe you’d have to be there.

They jammed, gambled, chips flew, Mike chattered, Steve came over from table 2 and told Mike to clam up…he was joking…but on it went.

About 10 minutes later, Jennifer looked over her shoulder and exclaimed, “Who the fuck’s been eating beans?”

I almost spit, I laughed so hard. The guys in her game told her it might be someone at Table 2. I said, “It isn’t me,” and kept laughing.

Table 2 was a little mass of insanity. $300-$600 Mixed games. A lot of grumbling and mumbling there, ‘scramble the deck’, ‘take the scramble off the deck’, ‘kill the deck’, ‘eat the deck’. Ok! Maybe that wasn’t the exact wording but it was a lot of c-r-a-z-i-n-e-s-s.

Table 3 was a Must Move $80-$160 Holdem running short handed. Sam G. was in the 9s. He had some deal worked out with one of our lower limit players, Scott. The details are unknown and aren’t even necessary. In this particular game, he was pretty quiet, not much going on in any seat as far as noise or chip slamming.

Sam’s portrait is pretty incredible at times. He’s a conundrum. The only thing that’s really standard, set in concrete, in his pattern is that he’s always looking for someone to put him in a game.

A few nights ago, Scott and Sam had ‘the deal’ going. I listened to Sam for at least two hours before I dealt to him. It was a barrage of, “Do you guys play here everyday?” – “You thought you could win with that hand?” – “You should know that nobody can beat me!”

And it goes on and on and on, interjected with some fairly humorous, sarcastically cutting jabs that would wound the person with low self esteem. As it was, he had most of the table in stitches as he took their chips.

He was ‘horsing’ with Raymond. When Raymond won a pot, Sam got a $20 chip, when Sam won a pot, Raymond got one.

Raymond speeds up the game, everyone has to put chips in the pot if they want to participate and with the action he gives, most pots turn into four and five way action, capped off before the Flop.

Once when Raymond won a pot, he threw me $1 and Sam $20…then asked Sam if he had remembered to pay him.

Sam replied, “Yes.”

Raymond went with, “Well I gave the dealer one and couldn’t remember.”

Sam replied, “If you give the dealer one, I guarantee she’ll take it.”

Raymond threw me a $20 chip. I thanked him and Sam jumped in, “Aren’t you going to thank me?”
I said, “Yes, you were the next person I was going to thank.”

He said, “Don’t worry, honey, we can split it up later.”
Cheers and laughs from the table.

The nature of the beast. Happiness when we win and conquer, even sharing and generosity. Pain and agony when we lose, punish everyone around us before we go home and kick the dog.

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