In a few hours I’ll be heading over to Greg and Amy’s place for the Saturday night card festival. Thankfully, our card game will continue – even if it is intermittently – and we will all stay in contact and see each other instead of drifting off into different life patterns that keep us apart. We may play: Pan, Big Deuce, Poker…and maybe try a bit of Badugi.

My week – in a nutshell – is not a poker story. I did deal Monday, I played on Tuesday, played on Wednesday, and went to work on Thursday planning on playing and E/Oing…is that a word? I had some errands to run before work and when I walked out of the ‘coach’ at 3:30 PM, I found this beauty – patiently waiting for me to arrive and notice. *applause*

When I checked in at work, I didn’t even have to clock in if I didn’t want to. The Card Fairy giggled and whispered, “Take that four day weekend woman!” Not one to ignore the Card Fairy, I did. I had planned to play as Marie was supposed to meet me for a visit and game play. Sure, we love to sit next to each other, visit, visit, visit, and try to win each other’s chips. I called her – she was late – new plan, she was playing at The Mirage, I was picking her up around 7:30ish. A long overdue visit was going to be made to her and Gary’s (her hubby) new digs. They bought a place in a secure building and completely gutted it and then started over from scratch. I’d been promising I would come over – probably for at least three to four months.

Gary plays almost exclusively in the $20-40 H game at The Mirage. Marie plays lower limit and visits several rooms during a week’s play. Shhhhh…don’t tell them I spread their picture all over the Internet. The wine and snacks were great, the company was fantastic because they listened while I gabbed – how can you beat that deal? Their new place is ultra kewl. Who’s expressing what here?

Friday wasn’t a complete waste but it was rather irritating. I took the Silver Steed in to see about getting the door fixed. Guess what, their damn computer was down, it might be up on Monday, check back if I wanted an estimate. The woman working behind the counter came out, looked at the door, said they would take off the mirror, the keyed entry pad, the handle, fix the small wrinkle at the edge, sand the door, color match the paint, and it would take about a week and a half.

I busted out laughing. A week and half? What the hell? Were they going to color match each pixel? That’s a Ford body shop, not some back alley, hammer banger. Well…she thought the actual time it would take was about five hours. But the paint had to dry. By now I’d stopped laughing. And I asked her about aligning the door. She said they’d just have to work on it. Oh my! But I couldn’t get an estimate and if I wanted to call on Monday I would know if the computer was up before I took the time to stop by. She sent me to a Mercury dealership down the road – for an estimate – because they did Fords. I stopped there. They didn’t even have a body shop anymore. WTF! I gave up. The door will have to wait for another day.

So…the card game on Saturday. Been there! We played Big Deuce all night. It was a cheese and chocolate fondue affair, along with a lot of other munchables. Amy has a small pug – Lucy. Lucy had a fit when I first arrived. But then she fell in love with me…I fed her melon until I can’t believe her little tummy didn’t explode. If I got out of my chair, she was on my heels as we headed for the kitchen and treats.

Don’t think Lucy doesn’t know what’s going on with cards either. She’s thinking, Go ahead, just make a move for your chips and I’m all in, Fool! It’s definitely the year of the dog!

Time to sleep. I’m off to help a friend with their computer tomorrow, around noonish, and then heading for Wynn to play a little poker and survey the action…and say hello to a couple of friends that I know will be there involved in and creating the action.