Decision Time: Poker Or Underwear?

This morning when I was writing that last post, I got so wrapped up in telling the story of beating down the stiff at the Pai Gow table that I'd forgotten a couple other details of my night in the orange-felt jungle.

Early on, I was sitting on a Pai Gow table that had just opened, and I didn't have a single player. I was like the lone dead game in the casino, as most hard-core Pai Gow players won't sit at an empty table--they want a chance to get an envy bonus from other players. So if nobody "breaks the seal", a game will sit dead for a long time. But as soon as one person bites the bullet and sits down, it's Game On! and the table usually fills up within just a couple of minutes.

So there I was, chillin' at my dead game, watching the TVs in the bar (love my new glasses!), trying to think of something funny or clever to say whenever the future wife cocktail waitress came by, and doing the mental countdown as to how much time I had before my weekend, when who did I see wandering through the casino? Why, it was my buddy Lars Vargas and his lovely bride Sherri, having just finished up a dinner date to the Mexican joint on the other side of the casino. So they came over and sat down to visit, and I thought it might entice a few players to join them, but nobody was biting. Regardless, we had a nice visit for about ten minutes or so before they headed back home for the evening. It was a needed break from the monotony.

Later on, a different cocktail waitress wandered by, one that I hadn't seen in awhile. So I said Hey stranger--where you been?

She told me that it was her first night back after having been out for a month. I asked if she had gotten 'downsized' like the other departments, where they took people off the schedule and said 'Don't call us, we'll call you!'.

Her response cracked me up.

She said, Oh yeah, I got downsized alright--I had surgery. I'm surprised you didn't notice!

Oh geez. The first time ever I wasn't staring at her rack, and I totally missed the fact that she had gone from about a 32-FFF down to about a 32-C. Seriously, I'd been looking at her face since she walked up, and I missed the new, normal-sized, girls! I guess, as a youthful indiscretion many years ago, she'd had her boobies super-sized. And believe me, she's a tiny little thing--like maybe 5-foot nothin' and about 98 lbs. But she'd had an absolutely *huge* rack, so much so that it was almost a tourist attraction at our casino.

Anyhow, I guess it wasn't a novelty anymore, and a husband and a couple kids later, she decided to get back to normal.

But I told her that she looked good and apologized for not noticing at first, and we had a laugh and she moved on. And I got back to spending most of that rotation relaxing at a dead game.

While sitting there, I was daydreaming, of course, mostly about winning huge at the poker table or dice tables during March Madness. Knowing that my poker game probably needed a tune-up, I figured I'd go play in that Casino Employee's Tuesday Night Tournament at the Silverton.

I may have mentioned it before, but it's $40 to get in, and they've only been averaging around 20 players per week, yet there is $1500 in guaranteed prize money. That's huge! And I've knocked 20 people out of tournaments many many times in the past, so I figured my chances were good.

Fast forward to today. I was sitting here surfing the web, doing my thing, when I checked my Yahoo mail account--the addy I give whenever I buy stuff online. I'd gotten a message from one of the places I shop that they were having a sale on Jockey underwear this week.

Now, I've got plenty of drawers, but that's a commodity like razor blades--you can never have too many because you're always gonna need them. But the one thing I'm woefully short of is black undershirts. Oh, I have piles and piles and piles of Tom Petty white undershirts--almost too many, in fact. But I work in a casino where we are required to wear black undershirts, if we choose to wear undershirts at all. I can't understand those nasty gross hairy sickos I work with who wear nothing under our polyester uniform shirts, and that's a rant for another day, but I cannot go without an undershirt, and all of mine are old and ratty--getting thin, faded, and worn out. And man-sized black undershirts are actually pretty damn hard to find. It's not like I can just walk into Target or WalMart and pick some up.

So when I saw the email ad, I followed the link and saw that they had black Jockey tagless undershirts, in my size, for 30% off. I *had* to buy some. So I bought three packs of two for about $55 with shipping. Not a bad price considering how bad I'm used to getting poked at the Big & Tall store.

But that was my poker budget for the evening--entry fee, valet, and cocktail tips, just in case I busted out before the money. I guess the tune-up will have to wait until next week when the budget is replenished. In the meantime, I can throw away all my nasty faded black t-shirts and start all over again.

Next on the shopping agenda, black polyester pants. Oooh la la, they're always a hit with the ladies! And speaking of the ladies, I suppose if my poker game was strong enough to win a big pile of money on a regular basis, I wouldn't need to wear underwear in the first place.

Gotta work on that.

Mikey