I spend a lot of my life just trying to survive time. Or I should say the lack of time. One of my co-workers asked me what I did on my days off, followed by, “Shop?”

Holy Andy Mackerel. Not this kid. No time for it. I won’t even bore myself with how I rush through life, trying to catch up with everything I feel I need to accomplish before I become a pile of ashes. I do take the time to STOP – and BREATHE – and TASTE my life and the events that keep adding history in my thoughts.

This little bundle is one giant bunch of wunnerfulness in my life. Riot comes to visit me almost every weekend and I get to fall back into the mindset of a child, where nothing is important in an adult world…including time.

So…after baby hugs and kisses and waking up to hit the real world of poker on Monday, I was pleasantly surprised to see the room had seven or eight empty tables. I’m sure that’s not how management feels about it but after our tournament in April and the overly long WSOP, it’s nice to be able to walk into the room and find some peace to the pleasant clatter of chips and chatter.

The Bellagio Challenge Cup was in progress when I clocked in. A $10,000 + $200 NLH Tournament with 97 entries was just winding down for the night. It stopped at 9 p.m. with 41 players left.

I dealt Table 7 – one of the tournament tables. T. J. was in the 7s and once when I was preparing to deal, collecting antes, etc., I said, “It’s your big blind.”

He looked at me, “I’ll take that from a new dealer but not from a seasoned pro like you.”

He wasn’t being mean, he said it with a half smile, and went on to talk about how the new dealers point at the player and keep jabbing the table in front of the player…as if the player never knows when it’s up to them. I agree. I hate it when I’m playing and a dealer pounds out the Flop and says, “Linda!” Chit Mon! Like I was out in the North 40 and didn’t know I had to watch out for cow pies.

Jeff S. was in the 5s and once when he folded, he turned his hand sideways, with a lofting flip, that exposed his cards to all of the players on the right side of the table. Granted, no one on that side was in the hand but there were players in the action on the left hand side of the table. I turned his cards up and said, “These are exposed and out of play.”

He asked me why I showed them. I told him the players to his right could all see his cards. He said they didn’t have cards. I queried, “What if one of them is in cahoots with someone that has cards?”

He said, “I don’t think you should show them.”

I ended it with, “Then don’t expose them.”

*****

I hit a $8-16 H game late in the night in which everyone was having a good time except the 2s. He looked at his cards, did the stall, holding them too long, twisting his face into a grimace or rolling his eyes in disbelief that these cards were being dealt to him. Each time the action came to him, it was the same routine. B-O-R-I-N-G! Not to mention slowing the game down.

About 20 minutes into my down, when he did it for the umpteenth time, and hesitated before discarding like he wanted to throw his cards, I said, “There are a lot more bad cards in the deck than there are good ones.”

I simply said it as a reality check for him to figure out that other people were getting those hands too and he wasn’t singled out by the Card Fairy to die alone in Bad Card Hell.

He glared at me, “I don’t need to hear it from you.”

He went on, “Now you’re laughing.”

No I wasn’t. But there may have been a teensy smile on my face…not uncommon when I’m dealing. I said, “But I’m definitely not laughing at you and the comment was in general, not aimed at you.”

He retorted, “You’d better quit while you’re ahead!” as he slipped backwards into Bad Card Hell.

I replied, “You got it!”

Poor guy. He doesn’t know that I have outs. I get baby hugs and kisses!