A novice poker player hasn’t felt quite right face to face the monster that is the game of poker, and he doesn’t know what exactly to do. He’s afraid to push his opponent, he’s afraid of being called, and he’s afraid of what the opponent has, as well as what he’s going to do next. The fear of falling into a rut is too much to bear, so heaving a sigh and consuming some willpower isn’t going to help him. Instead, he falls back on another familiar face: watching television.
He watched some poker on the Travel Channel, some boxing on the boxing channel, and began to notice that each time the sweet young woman would fight, she would use both hands. There was no possible way she could win with just one, and yet she would fight with both hands, and win. He realized that women can’t be everything, and he began to wonder if women get a bad beat every now and then. (Of course, he knew nothing about the women’s soccer beginning to see, but he was, at last, beginning to realize that women can have both savory hole cards and pitifully amateurish hands, too. He was beginning to see that women can fight back, too, and that can mean more money and more fun for some women, more than once, in fact.)
He watched some more poker on the Travel Channel, some cricket on Naga303, and again began to notice that whenever a woman would fight, she would use both hands. Again he began to notice that women can’t fight back. This time, though, he actually began to believe that women can fight back. Men are afraid to lose money, so if a woman is going to fight back, he figured, she might get beat. And, as he began to realize that women can fight back too, he began to realize that maybe women don’t need to be in the States to fight back.
About once every two hours, a woman would limp in, sleep a little, lose a little, and then limp back in. Normally, I would step in, break the tension, and tell the woman that she could play at another table, or the woman could have her chips moved to her more easily. I would also, occasionally, situation ourselves whereby we would deal the cards, and the woman would get all her chips in, and collect them and her chips out of my stack and our stack together. I would do this three or four times, and then two or three times, I would do this instead. versions of this method have always worked well.
On the fourth day, I had enough. I stepped in the shop and started to loathe my work. I began to despise my job. I began to loathe my job. I began to read one of my favorite fiction writers, Colman episodes. There was a guy in a car, preparing to steal a bank. And, lo! The protagonist was reading a book about blackjack. I became engrossed in the movie. I didn’t owe him any money. But, I minded having the movie around all the time on DVD, because it was nice to watch.
Then, when I had entirely too much free to do everything I intended, I got an email from the Casino Hotel. They were offering me a job. They said, if I would come to the Casino and have a job interview, I would get a bonus. Of course, I had no idea what the hell they were talking about, but I went in and had a job interview.
It was a job – a low wage, minimum wage position. I had thought it would be a lot better if I could get paid more. But, when I showed up for work, I was immediately offered a summer job. I had no idea how they were going to pay me, but I took the job, because one way or another, I was going to get paid. I was working Saturdays, and sometimes Sundays. I was extremely lucky, because we were in the middle of nowhere, had no cars, no house, no Fresno, absolutely nothing.
One day, while showing my friends how to count cards, I picked up a few small box, instantChinese take away boxes. I opened one, and in the box, there were two casino poker chips. I said, “Casino Hotel give me free casino poker chips to play with?” They said, “Why bother, they are a little short?” I said, “That’s not important, I mean they are $0.00.” I loved the idea of playing with a $0.00 price tag, until I saw the label. They were $25.00 worth of casino poker chips.