Ok kiddies, Professor Mikey has got a good buzz going, so today's class is going to cover a myriad of subjects. First of all, I want to thank Jack/Eric for sending along a little pre-NotSoberFest gift of 12-year old Nicaraguan rum. It's called Flor de Cana or something like that, and damn if it isn't the tastiest thing I've had all week. I swear I wanna mix it with peanut butter and make a samminch out of it.But after getting out of work last night, I stopped at the convenience store and got me another fountain Coke. When I got home I mixed in a generous portion of rum, changed clothes, grabbed a cigar, and headed down to the hot tub for some much-needed relaxation therapy. Talk about living the good life--it was a little slice of heaven.
Anyhow, since I drank a healthy portion of the rum, and I'm pretty damn worn out anyways, today's lecture will consist of four sections in no particular or coherent order, before I shuffle off to bed:
- A Nightmare on Fourth Street
- Master of the Double Switch
- Dice Dice Baby
- Cue the P0rn Music
First of all, I spend most of my day yesterday at school, dealing single-table sit-n-go's. They're a lot of fun, and you really get a good taste of what working as a tournament dealer is all about. Anyhow, at school, they structure the tournaments so that there aren't more than seven players per table, and one dealer deals the entire tournament. The blinds move fast, so people make a lot of moves, but it's usually over in less than 45 minutes.
Anyhow, I was dealing a hand, with seven people still in, and the blinds were at 100/200. The gal sitting Under the Gun went all in for her last $300, and all six people called. Great. Here comes the turn--I don't remember the card, but the first player to act went all in.
And then here is where it gets stupid--EVERYONE else went all-in! Good lord, there was a mountain of chips on the table! Since the entire table was all in, I was hoping the big stack would win so that I didn't have to run down everyone else's chips after the showdown.
So, all the cards were turned up, and it was the most amazing hand of poker I'd seen yet. Three people had 3-of-a-kinds, two were on straight draws, and one was on a straight flush draw. Luckily, somebody made a flush on the river, and knocked out all but one person, but damn, as a dealer, for a few moments, it put the fear of God into me. Holy hell--I was thinking as I turned over the river card How the hell am I ever gonna figure out this pot??? But it was actually much easier than I imagined. The winner took the main pot, and $1600 from everyone else. Only one other person had him covered, so it worked out fairly easily. But for a minute there, I had that dealer-in-the-headlights look about me.
But I figured it out without too much problem, and now I'm much more confident in my mad poker skillz.
Another good thing about poker school is that I met a pretty nice gal there last week, and we've hit it off. And she's not a psycho crackhead like that Lara chick I met when I first moved here. Anyhow, it makes class go much easier, and I tend to stay longer because we have a good time hanging out all day. She works at another casino, in the marketing department, and decided to take a stab at dealing. And as luck would have it, we have the same days off.
Anyhow, after today, I was thinking that I'd obviously like to take her out and do something other than going to a poker tournament, and I thought Hey, I could take her to the monthly wine tasting at the Mirage--that's always on Wednesday night. And then I got home to check my e-mailbox for my latest invitation--the wine tasting is next Wednesday, not possible for me to go.
Damn.
And why can't I go?
Well, being one of the few people at work with no kids and Halloween falling on my day off, I'm in high demand. My friend Jen got to me first, asking me if I'd trade days off with her at the end of the month so she could have Halloween off. No problemo, but trading a Friday for a Wednesday sucks ass as far as tokes go. But then I thought about it. I need next Friday off for Angy's happy-hour get-together during Not SoberFest. So just like any good National League manager needing a pinch-hitter in the pitcher's spot after the sixth inning, I went for the old double-switch. I told her I'd work Halloween for her, if she'd work next Friday for me. And then of course, we had to clear it with the shift boss.But, since I'm pretty much teacher's pet at work, it was no problemo. The downside is, I lose out on two different Friday's worth of tokes, trading them for sucky Wednesday tokes ($103 versus $158 last week, just to give you an idea...), and now I have two weeks this month where I have split days off. And I can't take my new hottie friend out for a sophisticated night of wine tasting at the Mirage. Oh, the plus side? I don't burn up a vacation day to hang out with Angy and the buffoons next week. And I get the happy satisfaction that goes with doing a favor for a friend.
Yay me!
Anyhow...
So last night I was actually scheduled on dice for the first time in about a year. In fact, around midnight or so, we got a new boxman chick, and the first thing she said was "Damn Mikey, I didn't know you dealt dice!"
I was beginning to think I didn't either.
It was such a novelty having me over there, that the assistant shift boss came over to give me a ration of shiat while I was on stick, just hoping I'd mess up. But I didn't. It's just like riding a unicycle. Yep, you get beat up for several months trying to get good at it, and finally it just clicks. I was doing just fine. And my table was nice and steady all night, making the shift fly by. And to top it all off, I only had one asshat the entire time (He bought in for a thousand bucks, and then proceeded to put $10 on the Pass Line, and $10 on the Don't Pass Line for every roll. Moron. He then wised up and put $100 on the Don't Come, but whatever number came up, invariably a six or an eight, he'd put up a $96 place bet on the opposite side and a $4 hardway bet on the same number. We rated him with an average bet of $0. Dipshit.)
Balancing out the cosmic scales, at one point, long-time reader and sometime commenter 'Drew' showed up, directly from the airport. He stood at my end and we had a few laughs for about an hour or so, and he was setting a fine example with his two-way hardway bets that never hit. Heh. He ended up making about fifty bucks or so before he left, and we made plans to get together for lunch later on this weekend.
But I haven't dealt dice in so long that it was like having an eight-hour workout, regardless of who was at the table. Seriously, I kept a towel handy to keep the sweat out of my eyes, and around 1:00 am, I got really busy--we had a hot shooter and I had four people at my end pressing and changing their bets like Craps was gonna be outlawed in the morning. I was bending over, stretching to do the payouts, and then standing back up so much that it felt like I was doing crunches for an hour straight. The worst was at 1:30, with just an hour and a half left to go in my shift, when I suddenly got a Charlie-horse in my abs!
Who the hell gets a Charlie-horse in their frickin abs??? I mean, calfs, or in the bottom of your foot, I can understand. But in the abdominal muscles? You gotta be kidding me!
Oh holy mother of god did that ever suck!
All I could do was try to lean back and stretch out, but the table was hopping and I had a ton of payouts to do, so I just had to gut up and take it like a bitch. I swear, I thought I was gonna just pass out right there, but as soon as I went on break I hobbled back to the dining room and ate a banana to get some potassium into my system, and I felt much better.
While sitting in there, I was talking to one of my recently-single again girl friends, and mentioned that as soon as I got home, I was heading to the hot tub. That kicked off an interesting discussion, where the bottom line is that now the tentative plan for Saturday night after work is that we're gonna pick up a 12-pack, head over to her place, and sit in her hot tub till the sun comes up.
Bow Chicka Bow Bow!
If that comes to pass, I'll be a gentleman and spare y'all the details, but needless to say, I'm looking forward to Saturday night!
In the meantime, the effects of a 44-ouncer with about 8 ounces of premium rum are starting to take their toll.
My body is worn out, I'm beat after doing craps-crunches for eight hours straight, and I want to get some sleep before the sun makes an appearance.
Y'all have a great day, and I'll hold the fort down out here in America's Playground.
Peace!
Mikey
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