Tag Archives: bellagio poker

A run-in with Devilfish, Herschel loves me, Sam G Lips off

I had this organized, little list, tucked neatly away in my brain, of all the things I would accomplish on my days off…but I had a visitor that screwed up my whole yard work plan. Rapping, tapping, shredding, and ripping through everything. Hello, Wind! Did you miss me? I haven’t missed you but then it’s hard to miss something that never goes away. Continue reading A run-in with Devilfish, Herschel loves me, Sam G Lips off

Trapped – $50-$100 PLO

Help Mrs. Wizard! There’s a lobster trap off the coast of the Poker Pit and I’m trapped in it! Oh my sins of Neptune…I’m being throwing into the cooking pot and it’s filled with a roiling mass of $50-100 PLO! 1s – Tony, 2s – walking, 3s – Herschel (a few posts on him last year) 4s – play over, don’t know his name but I remember him, 5s – Asian, unknown to me, 6s – S.C., appears around tournament time, 7s – Eskimo, 8s – name unknown but familiar, 9s – none other than the dreaded Devilfish.

Someone crank up the flame, I’m starting to cringe as my butt hits the seat and the 5s throws a $5,000 Baccarat chip to S.C. and wants him to change it. My antennae are up and I know I’m asking for more heat but I do my job. “That chip is not in play and not allowed on the table.”
Continue reading Trapped – $50-$100 PLO

Head-butting and hitting allowed, the room’s a screamer

Just as the room was a screamer, now it’s hit the other side of noise and confusion. It’s liveable. One can visit without screaming, faces take shape and resemble someone you really know instead of someone you think you know, the lists are not 60 deep, and we even have open seating with empty tables in the room. Phew! I knew the day would come but wondered if I’d live to get there.

*****

Something that has created a wrinkle in my brain and I can’t let go of it…Curtis B. was removed from Bellagio because he reportedly head butted an engineer in one of the bathrooms. A few days later, he was back in the room.

A few months ago, he was reportedly removed from Bellagio for striking a sweater that was with a player in the game Curtis was playing in.

Out of the blue, Curtis is back. Excuse me while I throw up here!!!! What does all of that mean?

I find it hard to believe that someone capable of physically striking someone else is allowed in any establishment.

Another side of it that I find hard to believe is that anyone that was 86’d or removed from any establishment would return to that establishment.

Color me weird here. If I’m ever 86’d from someplace, they would have to send me a gold engraved letter from the owner of the place begging me to return…guess it’s a pride thing.

*****

I sat right down in a $15-$30 Holdem game. The first hand dealt, I called the wrong hand as a winner and mucked the best hand. The 1s had the best hand and calmly asked me, “Would you turn those cards up please?

Shit! I haven’t done that in a million years but believe me, sooner or later I will and tonight was the night.

The 1s was wonderful. Not only did he NOT grab my arm and try to choke me to death, he threw lots of money in my pocket every time he won a hand. Geez! The Poker God really is looking out for me! She’s wonderful.

*****

Something that has nothing to do with poker. If the asshole down the street doesn’t go out and kill his car alarm, I’m going to go out and kill him and his car alarm.

*****

I followed Jim tonight. While dealing a $4-$8 Holdem game, I watched and semi-listened to problems Jim was having on the game in front of me which was $30-$60 Holdem. J.J. was having a fit with Jim.

A note on J.J.: Years ago, at the Mirage, J.J. played $20-$40 Holdem. He was filled with complete insanity for the game and played every night. His wife sat behind him now and then and he always seemed to win, not necessarily while I was dealing, but he always had chips in front of him and JAMMED it up every night. He laughed and giggled while he played, stacking chips and throwing them in the pot before he even looked at his next hand.

He did what most players that start too high too fast do. He dimmed over the years into the player that can’t beat the game, one that won’t adjust his play, one that always has a reason that he lost a pot or didn’t win and it wasn’t because of his play. He’s played intermittently for the last year or so.

J.J. and I definitely remember each other and we are not on bad terms, although he likes to make a statement when I deal to him that goes something like this, “Linda, you know I love you but you never deal me anything,” as he goes out to smoke.

This statement is totally ludicrous. Of course I’ve dealt him hands that he wins with…go figure.

On to tonight’s events. J.J. was having a huge FIT with Jim. Jim called the floor, then asked for the Shift Supervisor because he needed help. Kamell appeared and spent some time talking to J.J. and eventually I pushed Jim.

On the last hand that Jim dealt, J.J. waved his hands in the air and yelled, “Get out of here.”

Jim hadn’t even pushed the pot yet and he defended himself with, “I’m not going anywhere.”

It was ugly.

Jim left, I sat down and dealt. J.J. made a few comments about the fact that he had lost with A-A and Jim smiled.

Sorry kids but I smile a lot of times when I’m dealing. A friend walks by and nods hello. The guy next to me says something. The guy across from me smiles at me. How the hell can I not smile. It doesn’t have anything to do with the hand.

J.J. played up and down for a few hands, he was short chips. He made the comment, “Ok, Linda, put me out of my misery,” when he went all-in once. Sounds like a scene from ‘They Shoot Horses Don’t they?’ but we’re talking poker here.

He ended up going all-in on another pot and leaving the game. Someone noted that he’d whizzed up about $2,000 or more winner and then whizzed down through all of it.

Me? I try not to note any of that. I do note the player that thinks they are supposed to win every time they enter into a pot. I pay attention to the player that thinks I did it to them. Hey…those are the people I want to play poker with!!!!!

*****

On the fun side of poker, my last down broke up early with the players drawing for seats in a new game. Pete, Graveyard Supervisor sat down to lock up the game and someone came up behind me and started giving me a back massage.

Pete said, “Don’t be trying to get on the good side of the dealers, Gus.”

It was wonderful and went on for a few minutes. Gus Hansen put his face next to mine and said, “I don’t have the energy for a full body massage.”

I grabbed both of his arms and pulled him around me, demanding, “Come here!”

We visited for a few minutes…damn I love poker!

*****

The car alarm? I called 311, got the transfer to dispatch. I have to go out and find the car, license # and address to report them.

Pissed!

I did!

When I called back, they told me that if I knocked on the door, it would be faster than them getting there!

CHRIST! If the car alarm hasn’t brought them into the real world in four hours, how the hell is my knocking on the door going to do it?????

Let alone the fact that I’m a single, white woman…”Oh Boy, dipstick, let’s go knock on the neighbor’s door and wake them up at 6 a.m. with a complaint!”

Guess that’s why I love poker…no license plates or home addresses or phone calls…just shut up and deal!

Wednesday, May 14, 2003

The life of a dealer ain’t all bad. Just think of all of the people you meet, from all over the world, while you’re sitting on your butt, out of the heat and cold, and you get paid for it too. Of course you have to take into account that some of these people are lunatics and some of them are into reality, then add the factor that some of them that are into reality really lose it and become lunatics after they’ve been on a losing streak; the lunatics never step into reality so subtract that factor and there you have it…gamble, gamble, gamble.

My start in the line-up was ‘home’, the high limit. Seems that for some reason, even though it’s a random draw, out of 30 tables and 40 some odd dealers, I always end up in the high limit section. Not to worry, that’s exactly where I was tonight. I started on table 3, $75-$150 Omaha 8 or Better with a 1/4 Kill. They were fairly sensible and easy to get along with.
Next game $30-$60 Holdem, take a break, come back to another $30-$60 Holdem game that was short handed and broke down about 10 minutes into my down. Dead spread the rest of that down and move into a short handed $6-$12 Omaha 8 or Better with a half kill…they all warned each other that the first hand I dealt would be the last hand. I dealt it, everyone folded, the two blinds chopped and away they went.

After 10 minutes or so, my supervisor came over and told me take Ray out of 26, Ray was on overtime and going home. Yahoo! This put me right back in line to hit the high limit games in a few hours…right back up to ‘home’. Shit!!!

Imagine my surprise when I pushed Ray out of 26 and a few minutes later he was going into 14. I would have liked to go to 14, all the easy games were in that line-up, like $15-$30 7 Card Stud and $15-$30 Holdem. What the hell was going on there? I have no idea but I got the dealer bad beat. Mine is not to question why…like hell it isn’t but sometimes you’re just better off to shut up and deal so I did.

I did have a hell of a good time with the boys playing $1-5 7 Card Stud on Table 28. They laughed and whooped, hooted and cheered, teased each other and me, and I made money too. Good thing I got to laugh it up here because the rest of the night was…well, it was funny but I just couldn’t laugh out loud.

When I hit Table 1, it was $500-$1000 Mixed Games. Danny D. was in the 1s and NOT HAPPY! Curtis was in the 8s and even more UNHAPPY! They were playing Deuce to 7 Triple Draw when I came into the game and the next game was Omaha 8 or Better. Nothing really spectacular happened other than I had to dodge a few cards now and then and Curtis talked through most of my down. He flopped a set in two different hands in the Omaha and lost both of them. He took it pretty well but his fuse was ready to blow. He made the comment, repeated it actually, that if he wasn’t playing in a casino, he’d be carrying a gun because he’d swear he was being cheated.

Table One has the Shuffle Master on it and even if I shuffled the deck, I don’t know how, never learned, could give a damn about cheating because it isn’t my bag, so ask me how I liked this statement…meet me for a drink sometime and I’ll tell you.

I remember Curtis from years ago at the Mirage. He ran over the 7 Card Stud game, $75-$150, $150-$300, and had such a great time when he played. In those days, he said that whenever he needed money, he’d always get it playing poker. Good Lord, how time changes everything.

My next game was $400-$800 7 Card Stud. It was insane. Vasili Lazarou was behaving as if someone was taking his eye out with a spoon. It’s really difficult to have a fit with him when you’re dealing to him because even though a logger would pale at Vasili’s nonstop swearing, if I looked at him and asked, “You aren’t talking about me are you?”

He’d say, “Oh no, honey! I’m just mad at the cards.”

Well he had a hell of a lot of mad going on. The only person that wasn’t saying ‘fuck this’ and ‘fuck that’ was Mimi in the 2s. A censor could never keep up with these guys and their usage of the word fuck.

Vasili ended up winning four to five hands in a row, towards the end of my down, and when he beat the hell out of the 4s in a huge pot, the 4s said, “Nice hand.”

Vasili went into a drama scene about, “…you don’t know how much I lost, you don’t know what happened when I first sat down…”

Vasili can’t even take a simple statement for what it’s worth. A little lesson in poker psyche here…pay attention now!

Next game? Right back into the $75-$150 Omaha 8 or Better with a 1/4 kill. It was fairly easy and Joe had me laughing.

My last game was a repeater also, $30-$60 Holdem. The 8s in this game was a young guy, nice looking, so polite it was almost scary, he was there when I went through the game the 1st time. When I returned, he said he would definitely play through my down because I was such a good dealer. Little did he know that I’m a stone bitch and make mistakes just like everyone else but it was nice to hear.

If he bounced a card or a chip, he apologized. He reminded of a kid that grew up in a world where everyone told the truth and no one ever tried to take advantage of anyone. Right at the end of my down, he was heads up with the nut straight…it took a 7 to make a straight, the board was 5-6-8-9-3. He bet and told the other guy, “If you don’t have the nut straight, don’t call.”

The other guy called with a 7, the 8s showed a 10-7. The 8s tried to give the other guy back his last call of $60…he tried three or four times…finally the other guy took $20 of it for his small blind.

Excuse me here, all you pros and sharks, but when I left the box, I walked around behind the 8s and quietly said, “I don’t want to tell you how to play your game but don’t try to do anyone any favors by telling them what you have or giving them back a bet because they won’t do it for you.”

He thanked me and I went on my way.

If you think I’m out of line, I really don’t give a damn, I hate to see a lamb staked out for bait.

Bring on the medication

Last night I skated past all the high limit, tonight I think I hit everyone until the last part of my night. Everything was screaming mayhem. Microphones howled with pages for players to their open seat and table transfers and pages for phone calls, people talking and milling about, dealers, chip runners, supervisors, cocktails, porters, announcements of satellites being held for Omaha 8 or Better Tomorrow. Continue reading Bring on the medication