"You Don't Get Laid Much, Do You?"

Leona, Part 1

 Ah, the “woman said.”  That’s the most frequent label on this here blog (I would have  thought “dreaded pocket Kings” was the leader, but I’ve actually heard more outrageous things out of the mouths of the fairer sex than I’ve had horrific stories about the dreaded hand to tell—who knew?).  Ladies saying outrageous things, usually at the poker table.  Usually they’re just “one-offs”….one or two strange comments I hear from a woman.  But sometimes I run into a woman who gives me an entire (two-part) post worth of “woman saids.”  And earlier this month, I met “Leona” and the session with her gifted me with a shitload of “woman saids.”

Leona—and if you guessed that I named her after Leona Helmsley, you wouldn’t be wrong—specialized in both the off-color and the nasty.  In the case of a couple previous women I’ve blogged about who had behaved similarly at the poker table—you know, like Natalee (see here) and Didi (see here)—I was always pretty sure the nastiness was just part of the act, employed to throw the other players, especially the male players, off their game.   In the case of Leona, I’m not sure the nastiness was an act.  I actually think there’s an excellent chance this nasty side of her might be her true persona.  But I can’t state that with 100% certainty.

But it will take me awhile to get to Leona, first I have to set the stage, and maybe even talk about some poker.  When I first got to the table on this particular Monday night in Vegas, there was a familiar face occupying the seat directly to my right.  I recognized him as someone I had played with before in the same room.  And I recalled that he was a bit of maniac the time I played with but also a very friendly, nice guy.  In the course of our conversation I learned he dealt at another poker room in town, and in fact, a month or so later, I played where he works and was dealt to by him.  As it happens, I’ve written posts about both those sessions without needing to mention him, so there’s no point in giving you the links (you wouldn’t click on them anyway).  Let’s just call him “MD” (for maniac dealer) for this post.

He remembered me and we said hello to each other.  The main reason I mention him at all is that, because of him, I did my notes differently this nite.  Every now and then, if I feel there is an increased likelihood of a player asking me (or bugging me) about my note-taking during a session, I will abandon my usual hand-written notes and use my cell phone to take them.  My memory of MD was that he was so friendly that he might make an issue of it, so I decided to use my phone and keep a running e-mail to myself.   I know I should always do it this way, and hopefully one day I will.

MD raised to $20 (after a bunch of limpers), I called on the button with Ace-Queen.  Four of us saw the Ace-high flop.  No c-bet from MD, it checked to me and I bet $50. No one called.

I raised to $10 UTG with Ace-King of diamonds.  Four of us saw a flop of Ace-8-3, one diamond.  A guy made a $30 donk bet, it folded to me and I called.  Second diamond on turn, he shoved for $72 and I called.  The river was a King.  He had Ace-3 for a flopped two pair and I obviously sucked out on him.  Heh heh.

I raised to $8 with Queen-10 of clubs (right Coach, I not only played the evil hand, I raised with it).  Four of us saw the flop, which was Queen-Jack-10.  I bet $15 on the flop, one guy called.  The turn was a blank and I bet $25 and he called.  Hmmm. Another blank on the river.  I bet out $25 again.  It was a blocking bet, I was definitely worried about a straight.  The guy raised to $75.  Ugh.  Is it easy to fold two pair?  I guess I should have, but I couldn’t find a fold.  I called and he had King-9 for the flopped straight.  The evil hand indeed.

With pocket Aces I raised to $10 and had two callers.  I bet $25 on a low flop and the guy who had Ace-3 in the earlier hand shoved for less than twice my bet.  Of course I called.  I sucked out again when the river paired a deuce, giving me a better two pair than he flopped.  He left after that and that’s when “Canada” came to the table and the craziness got started.

I was in seat 4 and in seat 5 there was a guy from Indiana who was in town for the concrete convention.  Yeah that’s what he said.  A Canadian eventually took seat 2 and then moved next to me in seat 3 when MD left without saying a word.  I was surprised he didn’t say good-bye since he was friendly with everyone, including the dealers.  He did have “an accident.”  He managed to spill his adult beverage right on his crotch.  He announced, “Oh, it looks like I pissed myself.”  He left soon after that.  When Canada (as he was referred to at the table the entire nite) wanted to take that spot, I recommended that he slide his chair over instead of taking MD’s old chair because, “then it will look like you pissed yourself.”  He agreed.

Almost immediately, Canada got into it with Seat 8, who had apparently been acting like a jerk before I sat down.  Canada shoved on the river (possibly the first or second hand he had been dealt) and Seat 8 kind of gave a speech before acting.  He accused Canada of having a tell. He said something like, “Oh you think you have a big hand?  I can tell you have a big hand because of your carotid artery.  It’s pulsating.”  Instead of ignoring it, Canada answered in kind of a nasty tone I thought. He was challenging him to call I guess.  Seat 8 was speculating that Canada had a flush, but despite Canada’s “tell,” he was sure his flush was bigger than Canada’s flush.  Finally he called and asked Canada, “How big is your flush?”  But Canada didn’t have a flush.  He had a full house.  Seat 8 took off without showing his hand, with no chips to cash out.

I was worried that Canada was a nasty guy, but he was not at all.  Once the other guy left, and Canada was stacking his chips, he was friendly and joking about his carotid artery being a tell, and saying he had to work on that.

Well, seat 7 had been open for awhile and now we had two open seats.  Two players, a man and a woman, took the open seats at exactly the same time, giving the impression they were a couple.  The guy who took seat 8 was a big black guy who other players immediately thought resembled Mike Tyson.  He was built like him, to be sure. For the rest of the evening, he was referred to by everyone at the table as "Mike Tyson" so of course that's what I'll call him here. The woman was 30-ish and appeared to have no made no effort to dress up for the occasion.  She wore a cap that seemed like a cross between a baseball cap and a French Foreign Legion cap.  It was big, it had a big bill that really covered a lot of her face.  Her hair, which seemed to be blonde, was seemingly long and apparently tucked up into her cap.  It was really hard to see much of her face, but what you could see was at least on the cute side.

She was wearing pants, and on top she had a rather plain t-shirt with a v-neck that wasn’t at all low cut, and was quite loose, so not giving away much about her figure. (Note: I actually saw her—but did not play with her—back in the room several nights later.  This time she was wearing a much, much tighter top that revealed that she had much bigger boobs than I assumed from this night.  I know, I know, you’re all shocked that I would even notice such a thing.  It truly was a miracle.)  When she sat down though, she did kind of reach into her shirt for a second, and I wasn’t sure if she was adjusting her bra strap, trying to give us all a quick flash, or if she pulled her cell phone out of her bra.

I only go on so much about her appearance because it’s important to the story.  The girl kept telling us how pretty she was, how she was prettier than everyone else at the table.  Since she was the only female there at this point, this wasn’t a very hard thing to be.  I have to tell you, I was not offended by this comment.

Canada was interested in where everyone was from.  So after he found out the guy to my left was from Indiana, he was called “Indiana” the rest of the night.  The woman who had just sat down informed us she was from Florida and was referred to as “Florida” the rest of the night.  But in this post she will be called “Leona.”  Originally I thought Leona was visiting from Florida but I eventually figured out that she meant she was from Florida originally but now lives in Vegas, with her husband, who was nowhere in sight.  She claimed he wasn’t in the casino this night.

This surprised Indiana and Canada, the two most chatty players at the table (along with Leona) who had assumed that Leona and Mike Tyson were a couple.  She kept insisting that they were not a couple and had never laid eyes on each other until they happened to arrive at the table at the same time.  Mike Tyson said nothing.  Seriously, until one awesome line that I will get to in part 2, he sat in total silence the entire evening. He definitely didn't chew anyone ear's off.

Another player was seat 6, “Brazil,” so named because he said he was from—you guessed it—Brazil.  He didn’t say very much.  At one point, Leona mentioned that Brazil has some very beautiful women, and then used to hands to pantomime an hour glass figure for emphasis.  He confirmed that he was there with his wife and his kids and Canada said, “I’ll bet your wife is super-hot.”  Brazil didn’t respond to that.

“Jamaica” in seat 1 didn’t say much either.  He had to rebuy at one point but he left with a ton of chips.  I am sorry to say I don’t recall how he got those chips, but glad to report he didn’t get any from me. 

And when Canada slid over from seat 2 to seat 3, a guy with a New York Mets baseball cap took seat 2.  I believe he confirmed he was from New York originally so he became “New York.”  He didn’t say much, especially to Leona, but he did mention to Canada that he had come from a really great 2/5 game at the Venetian and claimed that 2/5 was his normal game.   As he bought in a couple of times to our game, he would take out a huge wad of $100 bills with a rubber band around them.  At one point, when he lost a decent size pot and someone questioned his play, he said, “Do you think this money means anything to me?”  Wow really?  Must be nice to have so much money that $300 (which was what he re-bought for every time he busted) means nothing to you.

Initially, they called me “Local” because they assumed I was a local from the fact that all the dealers knew me.  When I finally corrected them they started referring to me as “L.A.” until they found a different name for me, which I’ll get to in the second part of this saga.

The talk at the table was non-stop and it was mostly Indiana, Canada, and Florida, I mean Leona.  The two guys had already been bonding when Leona showed up and starting chatting even more non-stop than the two guys had been.

Leona liked to brag.  One of the first things she bragged about  (aside from her being so pretty) was how well off she was.  I’m not sure if anything prompted this, but early on she threw it in our faces that she was in a “higher tax bracket” than all of us were in.  She also mentioned owning multiple cars—a Mercedes, a fancy SVU, and possibly a third car.  Every now and again, for no reason that I could determine, she would go back and throw the “higher tax bracket” line at us.

At one point she was asked, if she was so rich, why was she playing 1/2 instead of a bigger game.  She said, “I’m just here to have fun, I’m not here to make money.”

The comment about her being prettier than the rest of us was in the context of how she could get away with stuff that we couldn’t (perhaps like the bragging about her wealth).  She said something like, “I’m not even trying to be pretty today and I’m prettier than all of you.”  Again, she was talking to all guys so it wasn’t much of a brag.  I don’t think any of us at the table wanted to be considered prettier than her.  But a couple of times when she said that, she’d sorta grab at her t-shirt and say, “I’m didn’t even dress up to look good, I just threw these clothes on, and I’m prettier than you.”  The “you” sometimes might have been all of us, but she was in particular sparring with Indiana.  The two of them mixed it up the most.  No reason for it that I could see. Indiana was a perfectly nice fellow if you ask me.

In the context of how pretty she was, she told us that she was 40 years old.  Actually she could have been—if for no other reason than the big hat covered so much of her face we couldn’t get a good look at her.  Then later she admitted that she “just said that” and was really (early 30’s).  By this time I was getting the idea this woman was going to excellent blogging fodder.

Early on, for no reason that I could discern, she said to Indiana, “I have a vagina.  You don’t have a vagina. You’d be better off if you had a vagina.”  That left Indiana speechless. 

But after she said this, she was about to say something else, and she put her hands together in front of her mouth and was about to pantomime something.  Before she could say anything more, Canada piped in with, “Oh, you’re saying he has a big cock?”  This was the only time all night Leona appeared to get embarrassed.  She shook her head to deny that that was where she was going and actually buried her head in her hands for a few seconds. She never completed her thought.

At one point, when Leona was preoccupied with players on her side of the table, Canada asked New York, Indiana and me, “I can’t tell.  Is she cute?”  New York replied, “Well, she’s ok on the outside but she’s really ugly on the inside.”

And that was before this happened.  New York had a fairly aggressive style, he raised often and his raises were usually large.  At one point, after he made a pretty big raise Leona shouted at him from across the room, “You don’t get laid much, do you?”  New York was not amused but said nothing.

Then, when Leona ran out of chips, she got up to go to the ATM. After she was gone, New York said to us, “Did you see that? When she turned around she purposely lifted her shirt above her butt so we could all see her butt.” Sadly, I didn’t see that because other players blocked my view.  So sorry, I can’t report on the quality of her ass.

So at one point she and Indiana were heads up in a hand.  Indiana bet and she said, “I think we have the same hand.  Do we have the same penis?”  That was the first time she hinted that she might have a penis, but it wouldn’t be the last.

Indiana or Canada made a comment about her panties.  I guess it was something like, “Don’t get your panties in a bunch” or maybe “Don’t pee in your panties.”  She responded, “Who wears panties?”

Later in the evening, she completely changed her position on who had a vagina.  After a few hands in a row where it folded to the blinds and they chopped, she said, “No one wants to play?  We all have vaginas here.  Then, she said to Indiana, “You have a vagina and I don’t.”  Indiana was once again speechless so I said to her, “Really?”  She answered, “Well, I have a literal vagina and he has a figurative vagina.  Literally, I have a vagina, and figuratively I don’t.  Literally he doesn’t have a vagina but figuratively, he does.”

And that’s where I’ll leave part 1. Trust me, part 2 gets weirder, nastier, and raunchier. And you can find it right here.