Three Wise Guys

Call me Ferris, because I skipped school yesterday. It's not like I was spending my day tooling around the Windy City in a classic Ferrari or pretending to be the Sausage King of Chicago to score seats at a fine restaurant--I just didn't feel like going, that's all. Besides, I was a little pissed off at Nick, anyways, so a day away was probably a good thing.

Monday morning, when I got there, I mentioned to him what a good experience it was dealing the tournament and that we should actually spend a little more class time working on dealing tournaments since they're so popular in all of the rooms around town. With that, he literally lost his mind and went on a tirade about how tournaments were bullshit and that we didn't need to waste any class time with 'em and how sick he was of everyone ramming tournaments down his throat. He went on for several minutes like a raving lunatic, as if the mere mention of the phrase 'poker tournament' set off a switch inside him that drove him into a blinding rage.

Whatever. As a paying student, I thought he was way out of line by discounting my suggestion in such a way and with such poor manners, and I find it somewhat ironic that he'll jump at the chance to send a bunch of students to deal an outside poker tournament, but refuses to let those same students work on the very skills needed to do it successfully, during class time. Not good business in my estimation, but then again, my name isn't on the side of the building, either. I'm guessing that he hasn't actually been in a live card room in awhile--that's the only reason I can come up with to explain his utter disdain for tournaments. But the smaller rooms around town do more tournaments than cash games nowadays, and all of the big rooms are doing at least three tournaments a day. I guess he figures we should all get out and find jobs dealing $2/$4 Holdem exclusively.

It makes even less sense when taking into account that the poker room manager of the Poker Palace came down to the school last week looking to hire two people on the spot to do nothing but deal nightly tournaments. I wish that would've happened after Monday's tirade, because I'd love nothing better than to be able to say in front of Nick and everybody "Sorry sir, I can't accept a job with you--I don't feel like I'm qualified because we're not allowed to learn to deal poker tournaments at this school".

Of course, I would've probably been tossed out on my ass, so it's probably a good thing that it didn't happen. But for the life of me, I just don't understand the aversion to tournaments.

(Best quote of the day--Only $800 for tuition... Imagine how much he would charge if they taught tournaments...)

After that, there was kind of a shitty vibe at school, so I only stuck around for about an hour or so and made my way down the street to the Hilton to meet up with Skip and Drew. I was a few minutes early, so I found my way to a Pai Gow table, tossed out a twenty and said 'Money plays!' I was well into my fourth push when both of 'em showed up, so I took my money off the table and we headed for the Venetian.

There was a short wait for a table at the Grand Lux Cafe, but we were seated in a booth in the bar after maybe ten minutes of watching the talent parade wander by. The Venetian is a Coke place, so we opted for just plain old cokes instead of beer or cocktails while we perused the menu. I mentioned that I was going for the Asian nachos as an appetizer, and Skip agreed. Drew said he'd just share ours.

The hell you will--you'll be sporting a bloody stump if you try to heist my nachos!

Yeah, they're that good.

We ordered some other food for main courses--I went with the Venetian chicken--chicken breasts grilled with mushrooms and covered in a lemon cream sauce, while Drew had a club sandie and Skip got some sort of other pasta dish.

Well, the appetizers arrived, and the Asian nachos were a huge hit. Skip kept moaning and groaning with pleasure so much that we had to tell him to tone it down, lest the other patrons think we were filming a porno in our booth. And all things being equal, those two fellas are about the last two people I'd be willing to star in a porn flick with, manboobs notwithstanding...

Anyhow, lunch was damn good--the Grand Lux is always a favorite, and Drew, being the big winner of the week (something about hitting three royals in less than 48 hours), was kind enough to pay the tab.

After lunch we waddled over to check out the new poker room there at the Venetian--39 tables in all of it's deserted glory. Well, that's not exactly true, there were about four games going, and another table full of dealers practicing their craft. I don't know exactly what the problem is with that room, why they can't get any business, other than the fact that it's located a good quarter mile from the nearest bathroom...

We didn't linger very long, making our way back to the valet to fetch Drew's rented Malibu before heading back to the Hilton. Once we got there, I figured I had about an hour and a half to kill, so I suggested we go play some poker. Unfortunately, there weren't any seats available at the tables in the Hilton's small room, so we retreated to our fallback position at the $10 Pai Gow table.

It started ugly and just went downhill from there. My first hand, I had three pair, Kings up. Dealer got a full house, Aces up. Ouch. After that I didn't win another hand until I got down to my case bet. Luckily I crawled and scratched my way back to a $17 profit after almost two hours. Skip lost about $60, and Drew left somewhere in the middle to hit his new ATM, the video poker machine.

Finally, around 6pm, we cashed out and left the casino--Drew was leaving in the morning, so we said our goodbyes there, and I offered Skip a ride back to Sunset so that he didn't have to waste four hours taking a bus out there, as long as he was cool with taking a side trip to the Hurricane Hole while I showered and got dressed for work first.

No worries at all--not only did he get to hang out at 'Ruben's House' for a short visit, he also got the supreme pleasure of being chauffeured back to his hotel in the luxurious Ghetto Sled. On some trips to Vegas, all wins aren't measured by visits to the cage...

Work was fun that night, although Skip had the bad fortune to hit a couple of my tables--they were ice cold, most notoriously the dice table they moved me to at midnight. As bummed as I was that Skip was losing, I didn't feel too bad about the representatives of the Hip-Hop Nation at the other end of the table who were playing like they learned craps from watching A Bronx Tale lose a couple of grand from their pimprolls at the same time.

It was the start of a new pay period that night, so I didn't feel too guilty about taking off a little early, although I took about six hours of EO the week before--can't do that again and complain about being poor, I suppose. But I got home and watched the Jack Bauer Power Hour before going to bed and sleeping until well past noon the next day.

Three hours left in the season--I just hope that the last 45 minutes or so is footage of Jack kicking Miles squarely in the nuts, repeatedly.

Mikey