“Albania,” I said, “do me a favor. Say this: Give that man his money.”
For some reason, Albania indulged me. And suddenly, there, sitting at the back table of the Excalbur Poker room sat none other than Teddy sbo .
I couldn’t have been more pleased.
And make no mistake, the bloggers will take over a poker room (more than likely the Excalibur). And when they do, you’ll never want to leave.
Number seven: The stories you won’t immediately tell your signigicant other
I tell Mrs. Otis everything. But some things I wait a few days to divulge. Like this moment in the Sherwood Forest.
As the sun again threatened to rise, two hookers who couldn’t land cowboys came up and grabbed us.
“Well, it looks like you’re it,” one of them said.
Oh, jeebus.
These girls were not attractive. They both looked used up and tired. Nevertheless, they were friendly and conversational. While G-Rob and I tacitly agreed that “never in the world would we ever consider…yadayada” we thought it would be fun to talk with them.
And so we did, for a very, very long time.
Before I knew what I was doing, I had vowed to help them land dates for the night. At one point I started trying to brush in cowboys who were walking by the bar.
As one guy in a cowboy hat walked by I said, “Hey, buddy, want a shot? Have a seat.”
G-Rob pointed out that I had just become a pimp. And not a very good one.
For how this could’ve ended ini my arrest, read the rest of “From rock gardens to Sherwood Forest.”
Number eight: Reasons to come back
By the time the fourth day had arrived, i was ready to call it quits.
Feeling more and more ill-equipped but determined to fight on for the final few hours, I dragged Marty and G-Rob through the pit and enegaged in a little single-deck blackjack. Just when the table was getting hot and our drinks had arrived, Dr. Jeff called me on my cell phone.
“You better get back to the poker room. There was just a big fight in here and I think it has something to do with Pauly.”
I colored up in seconds, grabbed my drink, and made tracks back to the poker room in time to watch the flor crew pick up the final chips from the floor. I scooted over to Pauly’s table where he told me the story.
I sat back and thought, “That should just about do it. This trip has now seen everything.”
Even if you’re not playing in the tournament, you’re going to have stories to tell forever.
Number nine: The friendships last beyond the weekend
I’d be hardpressed to tell you anything about how BG, G-Rob, Eva, and Al played in the Holiday Classic, with the excpetion that Al is colorblind and couldn’t tell the difference between green and gray chips. But, I know that these crazy folks showed up out of the blue in the Bahamas when I was there and we had a ball.
Here we are with Isabelle.
Number ten: ?
Well, that’s a secret. But keep an eye here and on Guinness and Poker in the coming days. If everything works out, you may not give a damn whether you play in the Classic or not.
So, there’s ten reasons out of a hundred I have.
I bet there are some other folks out there who have a few of their own.
