I love the first Monday of the month. All the pension checks have been deposited and the geezers head out to the casino to try to make a few bucks. So I'm in the poker room and there's five at my table. Hole cards come out and I get KdTd, Not bad, not great, but not back. Three of the other players drop out and the one guy that left goes in big. I figure he's got a pair of aces or kings or some other hand, but I'm interested in seeing the flop, so I call. The following cards come out: Ad 9d 2d I've flopped a nut flush. At best he's got three aces and the only outs he has are if he gets another ace or manages to get a fullhouse. He immediately goes all in, so I know he's got aces. I call and the cards come out and I'm right. He's got Ac Ah Now, there's a considerable about of money on the table, so I'm a bit worried that he's going to get the out cards, but I know the numbers are on my side. The turn: 3c The river: 4d My flush beats his 3 of a kind. As Phil Hellmuth puts it "I dodge bullets baby!" As great as winnung the money was, the look on his face was priceless. He couldnt believe he lost his money. I've seen it before; old guy thinks he can make his pension dollars go further by playing cards and ends up eating dog food and skipping meds because he loses. Fuck him, it's my money now and nobody put a gun to his head to make him play. Besides, I like taking their money. I like watching their dreams go down the toilet. That's better than the cash I make. My wife doesn't like my attitude, but I'm cool with it. After a bit, I cashed out, and as I was walking to the car I saw an ambulance out front and they were loading someone in the back. It's possible that the old guy knew he was going to have to tell his wife that he blew their pension for October on a couple of aces and decided that having a heart attack and dying was the better option. Good times.
Wyatt Earp: Didn't you always say gambling's an honest trade? Doc Holliday: No, I said poker's an honest trade. Only suckers buck the tiger. The odds are all on the house. -Tombstone
My mama had a brother who was an abusive gambler. She is always worried about me falling into the same trap so I rarely play. One of my buddies used to go to PartyPoker and win money often. They would send you these debit cards and he'd cash them at a bank. (I think there are rules to this now.) Anyways, he showed me this book on Texas Hold Em and how to play the odds. I browsed through the book and out of the 5 or so poker games I've played in the past year, I've won three of them just based on what I remember from them. People accuse me of hustling them all the time because I'm still not sure on the rules, and that makes people think I am a liar or a newbie. There are occasions where people do something stupid and end up burning me, but if you play the odds, chances are, more often than not, you will come out ahead. It also helps to be the one sober player in a table of 6 other drunks.
Ok, if the guy had an Ace of diamonds, would he also have a flush? There were 3 diamonds on the flop and one on the river. That would give him 5 diamonds with a high diamond ace. Or does it go to you because your hand had more diamonds than his?
I'm glad I have no mental ability to hold several different things in my head for more than 30 seconds....or I might be tempted to play cards, and thus get into playing poker for money.
I would have better odds getting shot at. I can't even beat a child at checkers. And forget that tick-tac-toe playing chicken at the fair!
