The Mystery of the Stolen Diet Coke

There’s good news and bad news.

The good news is, as I start this blog post, I’ve just sent off my latest Ante-Up column to my editor, so I can focus all my attention, writing-wise, on the blog.

The bad news I need to do one more quickie, not-really-a-full-length-blog-post for now before getting to the meaty stuff.  I am hoping that by the time my self-imposed deadline for my next blog post rolls around (Sunday evening), I’ll have a real juicy, lengthy, blog post for you folks—you know, the kind that take two days to read.  And there will even be some poker content!

But for now, here’s a quick little anecdote having to do with one of my biggest pet peeves.

In fact, this pet peeve was the very first item in the post I did nearly two years ago (see here) which I titled “Things That Piss Me Off.”  Yes, it really pisses me off when any glass of liquid refreshment (usually diet Coke) that I have at the poker table is taken away before I’m done with it.

So last Saturday I was playing in a tournament at the Aria.  It was the second or third break.  I got up to get rid of some of the aforementioned diet Coke that I had been consuming.  I guess I should have taken a picture of my glass for evidence.  There was more than just ice in it.  There was definitely some diet Coke left.  Maybe not ½, but at least 1/3.  I’m sure.  There was certainly enough left for anyone to identify that it was a cola type drink and not just water or maybe a 7-Up.  Definitely.

And so when I got back to the table, ready to count my chips for my notes, I was shocked to see that my glass of diet Coke was gone.  I was not happy.

I said, to no one in particular, “Who stole my diet Coke?”  The dealer—the same one that had been there when I left—heard me but said nothing. There was no waitress around to complain to, of course.  Then I remembered the waitress who had been serving us had said, late in the previous level, that she wasn’t taking orders as she was going on break.  Great, so it would be awhile until I could get another soda.  Fortunately, I am now prepared for this so I had ordered, as my first drink, a bottle of water, which I had barely touched (preferring the soda).  But since I was sure she had left the room to go on break before I did, I wondered who the hell had taken away my glass of soda.

In fact, when this waitress had come around as the tournament began, she had a tray full of waters and I asked for one, but she had just given the last one to the guy next to me.  So when I asked for a water she said, “Well, I just gave the last one to him, but don’t worry, I’ll be back.”  I said no problem, I was sure she’d be back with my water.  So she joked, “Yes….I’ll be back, and I’ll ignore you all day.”  I laughed and said, “Well you won’t be the first waitress to ignore me.”  Then, I realized I didn’t want to make it about her job, so I added, “You won’t be the first woman to ignore me.”  Another player at the table, who didn’t know me from Adam said, “Or the last.”

Some time went by when a different waitress came by to take our orders.  When she asked me what I wanted, I said, “A diet Coke….to replace the one that was stolen.”  I dunno why I said that, I guess I was still a bit perturbed by the missing soda.  And so the waitress just stopped dead in her tracks and looked at me.  “Stolen?”  I said yeah, something about it disappearing while I was on break.  I didn’t think much of it but then a few seconds later, someone else tried to get her attention to order a drink and she said, “I’m sorry….I’m trying to process the fact that his drink was stolen.”  She eventually recovered and I eventually got a new diet Coke.

The same waitress brought me at least one more soda and then the original waitress returned.  When I gave her my order (and honestly, all I said was, “diet Coke, please”) she stopped, looked at me and said, “Are the player who had his diet Coke stolen?”  I couldn’t believe it.  How did she know about that?  I said to her, “You heard about my diet Coke being stolen?”  She said she sure had, the other waitress had alerted her.  The player next to me said, “Everyone in the casino knows about it by now.  The police are on their way.”  I said, “Wow…I was only going to tweet about it!”  That’s actually true. Since my readers are aware of this quirk of mine, I did consider tweeting about the stolen drink, but I got too busy trying to play poker to bother.

About an hour and at least one more diet Coke later, I order yet another one from this same waitress. When she returned with a tray full of drinks, I readied my near-empty glass and the dollar bill I was going to tip her. But she said, “I’m sorry, someone stole your diet Coke off my tray, I’ll be back with yours.”  I couldn’t make this up folks!  The player next to me—the same guy through all of this, said, “It’s ok….he’s used to it.”

There’s an addendum to this story.  The next night was my last night in town, and I was playing cash at MGM (right before my encounter with the hooker that I just told you about). The room wasn’t that busy so someone I guess decided that one waitress could handle the whole room.  Not a good idea.  Even tho the waitress assigned was one of good ones, she seemingly ignored my table a time or two.  Finally when I saw her in the room, I got up to order right away so I could then visit the restroom and not miss my blinds.  I asked her if she was still handling our table and she apologized, saying that she had a full tray and just couldn’t get to us.

But she took my order even tho she hadn’t reached my table. I started to head to the restroom and then remembered that I had a glass of mostly ice there—but there was still quite a bit of ice.  I turned back to her and said, “Please don’t take my empty glass.”  I guess I should have said “Please don’t take my ice” or something else.

Of course, when I returned, the glass was gone.  Perhaps she hadn’t heard me, or perhaps she misheard me and thought I was asking her to remove the glass.  Sigh.

The good news is that she returned with my new diet coke in less than five minutes, so I forgave her.

I’m all heart, really. 

I’m gonna have to start putting a lock and key on my damn soda.  

EDITED TO ADD: GRANGE HAS DONE BASICALLY A REALLY LONG COMMENT ON THIS POST AS A POST ON HIS OWN WONDERFUL BLOG, AND YOU ABSOLUTELY MUST READ IT AS THE FOLLOW UP TO THIS.  SEE HERE!