What the Ladies Have Been Up To

And by “ladies” I am referring to the ladies of the evening.  Hey, this blog is too classy to refer to them as “hookers.”

Yeah, right.

For all the time I spent in Vegas, there were not a lot of hooker sightings.  But there was one particular unusual PHS (possible hooker sighting) that I want to report.  Before I get to the main event, a couple of quickies.

One Saturday afternoon I encountered the earliest (by time of day) hooker sighting I can recall.  I was walking past the bar near the hotel’s lobby (a place where one can often see the working girls around midnight or so) and I saw too fairly attractive ladies sitting on a little ledge on the outside of the bar.  One was on her cell phone, the other one was just looking around.  As I passed them, the one not on her phone said to me, “Where you going?”  Since I don’t think she was there taking a survey, pretty sure she was a hooker.  The odd thing was this was around 4:00PM.  Not the time you’d expect to see a couple of girls plying this particular trade. Didn’t realize that job has a—you’ll pardon the expression—“swing shift.” I passed them without responding. 

Near the end of my trip—in fact, it was the same day I played with Orel Hershiser (see here)—I found myself walking on the Strip and heading into the Monte Carlo. It was around 7:30PM or so.  I never noticed before they have a bunch of tables and chairs outside as you climb the steps to enter the casino.  I looked around and it didn’t appear that there was a café or a bar there, and no one had any food or drinks.  So just a bunch of tables and chairs out there for tourists to take a rest. 

As I was going passed what appeared to be the last table there, I heard a female voice call out, “Hi!“  I turned and saw a very young, very attractive young woman sitting alone at the table, and she was clearly talking to me.

I stopped and turned towards her and she continued, “Whatja doing out here all alone?  Why don’t you come talk to me?”

I said, “No, I don’t think so.”  She responded, “Oh come on, sit down.  Let’s chat.”

I said no again and she pressed it.  “Come one, why won’t you chat with me?”

When I said no again, she said, “Why not, why not?   But I moved on. Another rather early hooker sighting—the sun was just setting.

And that brings me to one of the strangest things I’ve seen lately.

On this particular Saturday night, I was taking a dinner break and eating at the deli. I took my sandwich and grabbed a table and noticed at a table in front of me a very odd couple.

The lady was dressed to kill. It was around 8:30 PM, a bit early for the Slut Parade, But she looked perfectly dressed for the club.  She was black and had an orange designer dress.  I only say “designer dress” because it had the brand name “Bebe” on it.  The dress was very, very short and absolutely skin tight.  Seriously, it looked like this dress was spray painted on.  It was cut up to her neck so there was no cleavage, but the dress was so tight I could see her nipples through her dress.  Very prominently so.  It was either very cold in there or she was happy to see me.  Actually, her nipples were so prominently visible it looked to me like there were built-in fake nipples as part of the dress.  Do they make dresses with fake nipples?  She had a very attention-getting figure—she was packing plenty, both front and back.

I wasn’t thinking hooker because, as I’ve said before, the Club girls dress a lot sluttier than the hookers.  The hookers dress more conservatively and there was nothing conservative about this outfit. 

But then there was the guy she was with.  He was older—a lot older.  Late 50’s maybe earlier 60’s.  Grayish, balding hair, dressed like a total slob.  It didn’t look a searing romance to me.  He was eating a sandwich and she was not eating.  She only had a soft drink. 

And she was kind of yelling at the guy.  I couldn’t quite hear what she was saying, but she may have been complaining about how messy he was with the sandwich.  And then, after almost every bite, she would take a napkin and wipe his face—like he was a child.  Also, she took the napkin and wiped his hands.  And also slapped his hands, like he was being bad.  I didn’t hear anything out of him but grunts.  My first thought was that the guy had “special needs” and was perhaps mentally challenged, and that she was his caretaker.

But then I thought…..she’s his caretaker dressed like that?  Well maybe she’s waiting for the next caretaker to show up so she can go to the club.

Not very likely. 

This continued for a few minutes.  After he was done eating, she wiped his hands and face again, slapped his hands, and then cleared away the paper plates and took them to the trash. 

The two left, and the guy walked perfectly fine—he didn’t need any assistance to walk. At first, they appeared to be walking off in slighting different directions, but before they both left my line of sight, I saw them come back together and the guy put his arm around her.  And they wondered off out of sight.

My assumption is that the special treatment he had received from the girl was all part of the service he had requested when he had arranged this, ahem, “date.”

It takes all kinds.

OK, so the girl in my story wasn’t showing any cleavage.  So sue me.

"What? I Always Dress This Way!"

This session took place during EDC, 2015.  For a recap of EDC 2014, see here.  There wasn’t that much new for EDC this year, just more of what I reported on last year.  Not that that’s a bad thing, but it means I can’t really do an entire post about it.  Trust me, I saw a lot of attractive young ladies (emphasis on young) revealing various parts of their bodies in, well, let’s just say, some interesting ways. 

I passed one such lady on the way out of the Men’s room and I wish I could better remember her outfit.  It was bizarre, but because of the line she had, I almost completely forgot what it was.  I mean, it was some kind of bikini-type outfit, maybe had some fur.  I think this gal also had some body paint and something odd in her hair that stood out. So, it probably wasn’t just from the amount of skin she was showing (which was plentiful) that I must have given her a “WTF?” look.  Also, this gal seemed a little older than the average EDC girl you see.

Anyway, she obviously noticed the bemused look on my face and she said directly to me, as she passed by, “What?  I always dress this way.”

Anyway, this was the day after my Day 2 at the Golden Nugget tournament (see here) and I decided to not play another tournament so soon after the grueling (but successful) experience of the two-days at Golden Nugget.  So it was late afternoon when I got into a cash game at MGM.  There were a couple of guys at the table who were in town for EDC and just killing time waiting to head back for the Saturday session.  They complained about the parking over there—they said when they (tried) to leave the venue at 5AM that morning, it took them nearly three hours to exit the parking lot!  Yikes.  I don’t think I could have survived that with my sanity intact.

There was an older couple at that table, and they asked the two guys what the attraction of EDC was.  One of them explained, “There are lots of beautiful women there.  Some of the most beautiful women in the world…..there’s like 50,000 beautiful women there.”

The guy added, “I mean, how can you resist a place with 50,000 beautiful women?  Now do you want to go?”

The older gentleman was not exactly the target demographic for EDC. And he replied to the guy, “No…..I already have my own beautiful woman,” pointing to his wife. Ahh, very sweet. Bet that guy got some that night.

The EDC attendee continued.  “There’s 50,000 beautiful women there….and only 40,000 STD’s. So that’s pretty good odds, right?  You got what…a 20% chance of not getting an STD!!”

We all got a good laugh out of that, and then he said, “You know, they say, ‘What happens in Vegas stays in Vegas,’ but that’s not true with an STD.”

The two EDC guys left, presumably looking to hit on a 4 to 1 shot.  There was this older Asian man who played a hand extremely odd that almost led me to make a bad play later in the session.  On the earlier hand, there was no raise and four people saw a flop of Ace-Ace-Jack. It checked around.  The turn was a deuce and it checked around again.  The river was another Jack and again, no one bet it.  One player showed King-high, thinking that based on the action—or lack thereof—that was probably the best hand.  But the older Asian man turned over Ace-rag for a full house.  Huh?  How does he go three streets without betting?  And also, since there was only $8 in the pot, he didn’t qualify for a drawing ticket.  If he had bet $2 and gotten a call, he would have gotten a ticket. Or he could have bet more, hoping to make a little money with his boat. The player next to me and I couldn’t believe he never bet.

So a while later I raised to $8 with Ace-3 of spades and had three callers, including the older Asian man.  The flop was great, Ace-high with the other two cards being spades.  I bet $20 and only the Asian gentleman called.  The turn was a red King and we both checked.  The river was another low non-spade.  This time the guy led out for $45.  I almost folded.  This guy hadn’t bet a boat on the river earlier, so he seemed like an unlikely candidate to be bluffing here.  I figured he had an Ace and his kicker almost had to be better than mine.  But I thought it over and decided it was worth a call—it just wasn’t a big enough bet to get me to fold top pair.  I made the hero call.  He said, “You’re good, I have nothing.”  Actually he showed his hand and he did have a pair of 4’s. 

Sometime after that, I called $7 with pocket deuces and it was five of us seeing the flop.  I caught my set, but the flop contained two clubs.  The preflop raiser checked and I was second to last to act, so I bet $20.  Only one player called—he was not the preflop raiser and he had checked in front of me.  The turn was a second 5, and I checked behind him with my boat (I was still in the mode of slow-playing monsters, something I need to correct). There was a third club on the river and this time he bet out—$40.  I made it $100.  He called without much thought, but folded when I showed my full house.  Since he knew about the drawings, he must not have had a flush or he would have shown it for the ticket.

I raised to $8 with pocket Kings and had three callers.  The flop was low and no one called my $25 c-bet.  Note: I only included that hand here to remind everyone—especially myself—that I can win with the dreaded hand. 

On the button I had Ace-King off.  The guy I just mentioned—who paid me off for my deuces full hand—opened to $15 and I called.  It was heads up.  The flop was Ace high and he led out for $25.  I called.  He led out for $50 on a blank turn and I called.  He checked the blank river and I checked behind him.  He showed pocket 8’s, unimproved.

I’d like some feedback on that hand.  There was a guy at the table who I’d played with a lot who was visiting from Europe and I heard him say once that he was trying to get good enough to become a pro.  He was talking to some buddies who were just watching.  He said, “Some guys just don’t want to lose.”  In other words, I played that hand too meekly.

I can see his point, but on the river, I can’t help thinking that if I bet, I’m only going to get called by a hand that beats me.  Wrong-headed?  I would have bet if he had checked the turn, but he showed strength firing a second bullet. And yeah, I could have raised his flop bet.  But I’m thinking I don’t want to make the pot too big with just a top pair hand where I have lots of showdown value.  I know this is something I need to work on.

Anyway, after a long, long day of poker, I finished up over $200 and I settled for that.

"You Gotta Protect Your Aces"

Jumping back and forth in time to write these blog posts sometimes creates some interesting surprises for me.  When I went back to listen to my voice notes so I could write this here post, I discovered an incident I had completely forgotten about. It was eerily familiar to an incident that had occurred over a month later—one that I’d just written up a few days earlier.  It’s a sad commentary on the state of my memory these days that even when the story I told here actually took place, I didn’t flash back to this earlier incident which took place in the very same poker room just as my trip was getting under way.

In fact, this session took place the day after I played Colossus (see here and here).  And this was the day that I found out that Colossus had broken Vegas poker.  Because of the ripple effect of all the folks playing Colossus, most of the Vegas poker rooms were packed and had huge waiting lists to get into a cash game. Not expecting this to happen, I had decided to forego a tournament on this Saturday, and regretted it once I saw how busy all the cash games were.  Although my original plan was to spread my poker business over a couple of rooms, once I got into a game at MGM, I decided to stay put for fear of having to wait forever if I moved on.

So it was middle-afternoon when I got into my usual 1/2 game.  My first seat was one of the corner seats that I hate (difficult for me to see from there) so after just a few hands I moved to seat 1 when that player left.  I folded my first hand in the new seat and then found myself holding two Aces.  I hadn’t played a hand or put any money in a pot to that point, so I still had my entire $200 in front of me.  A player limped and I made it $10.  An older guy with a baseball cap (worn the right way) who had over $400 in front of him made it $30.  There was a clueless guy who came to the table short who called.  I say he was clueless because it seemed like a hand or two earlier he didn’t seem to know what the big blind was—not how much it was, but what it meant to be the big blind.  Perhaps he just didn’t realize it was his blind.  But he had a short stack, like $47, He took my old seat.  I guess he came from another table because otherwise he was well under the minimum $100 buy-in.

I put another $100 out.  Baseball cap guy announced, “I call—all-in.”  Damn. He wasn’t angle-shooting, he just messed up.  Of course the dealer told him that since the first thing he said was “I call,” he couldn’t go all-in.  Clueless guy put his last few chips in and we saw a flop of 10-10-9.  I immediately put out the rest of my chips and the big stack snap-called.  The last two cards were low and he showed pocket Queens.  The clueless guy had King-Queen. It was a pretty nice pot. After I stacked and counted my chips, I had $437 in front of me. 

Baseball cap guy felt the need to defend his play.  “Anybody would have done that, right?”  I guess he was talking to me, I didn’t say anything.  He turned to the guy sitting between us, who he had been playing with for some time—and also happened to be a former poker dealer I’ve played with several times before and who has dealt to me in another room and who knew that I wrote for Ante Up. “You would have done that, right?”  The ex-dealer is a real loose player but he didn’t answer the guy either.

I dunno, I think he maybe could have found a fold there.  He didn’t have any read on me, but this was the first hand he’d seen me play (out of maybe 6, tops) and I not only raised, I four-bet him.  How many hands am I doing that with?  I think Queens was an easy lay-down after I put out half my stack before the flop.  Maybe I’m doing that with Ace-King and then he’s got a coin flip for (potentially) $200?  Not sure I agree that “anybody” would have done that.  But I was happy he did.

Within a relatively short period of time, baseball cap guy ended up losing his entire stack, rebought, and then started bleeding more chips.  His stack was less than $100, and he started playing blind.  Not always but he’d decided at the last minute to play his hand blind.  Sometimes he’d look at one card, other times he’d just decided to call bets—or make bets himself—without looking at his cards.  Depending on his stack, he’d sometimes shove blind, but mostly he’d play normal—except that he wouldn’t look at his cards.  Eventually, before deciding to stack off on the turn or the river, he might look.

He kept winning.  In fact, it seemed that whenever he didn’t look, he’d win, but then he’d have enough chips to play with for real, so he’d look at his cards, and then lose.  He started celebrating when he’d win if he had played blind (and it seemed like he could only win if playing blind), pounding the table with glee, getting out of his seat, whooping it up if he won a hand—doing a little dance, congratulating himself on his win.  Now, because of his short stack, he wasn’t winning much, and it was obvious that he was celebrating more because he was amazed that he kept winning this way than because of the amount of money he was stacking.

There was this young guy at the table, obvious grinder type.  Hadn’t said a word the entire time I’d been there.  And he lost to baseball cap guy and doubled him up.  It wasn’t much, and I didn’t note the hand, but I’m pretty sure the grinder had a big hand and the guy playing blind totally sucked out on him.  And so he got up and did his dance, and was all excited, and started yelling gleefully to a guy at the other end of the table, “Did it again…that’s what, 5 times in a row I won playing blind?  Isn’t that great?  That’s awesome! I should play blind all the time!” 

Yeah, it was annoying.  And to some degree he was rubbing it in….but again, it was more because of how he won than that he was celebrating a big victory.  And he surely wasn’t bragging about his brilliant play, he knew how damn lucky he was.  He was basically celebrating his dumb luck, like a guy who was dealt three blackjacks in a row at the BJ table might.

But the young grinder didn’t appreciate losing to him, not at all.  And so, for the first time since I’d gotten to the table, he said something.  He said to the older guy, “Shut the f*** up.”

The older guy was taken aback, and the grinder continued.  “You’re an old man.  Show some class.  Don’t rub it in.”  The old guy didn’t really respond, I think he was shocked.  But the kid continued to grumble about the guy’s behavior, and threw in a few more f-bombs to express his disgust.

I have to admit, the kid had a valid point.  But you know, you can’t tell another player to shut the f*** up.  Meanwhile, as soon as the first f-bomb came out of his mouth, the dealer warned him to watch his language.  He ignored her.  The dealer threatened to call the floor, but the kid couldn’t stop himself, he kept grumbling about the guy’s behavior and kept using foul language to do so.  He seemed surprised that he was the one being warned.  He pointed out to the dealer that it was the other guy who was engaging inappropriate behavior—celebrating his wins excessively. The dealer kind of indicated that both of them were out of line and warned the older guy about excessive celebrating.  She kept saying to the kid, “calm down” and “you can’t talk to another player that way.” But when the kid wouldn’t shut up, the dealer did indeed call the floor, who happened to be the shift manager.  All the older guy would say was, “Hey I haven’t used any bad language.”

I was kind of surprise what happened next.  The kid was in a hand when the manager showed up and got the story from the dealer. Then, the manager said to the kid, “Go ahead and finish this hand and then you’re going to cash out for the day.”

Wow, that was a quick hook.  I would have expected the manager to speak to both players individually and warn them about their behavior.  I personally think that just hearing that again from the manager—along with some time lapse—would have done it. I also thought he might have just told the kid he had to change tables to get away from the guy who had pissed him off.  But no, he just kicked him out for the day without even listening to him.

This didn’t exactly please the kid.  He pointed to the other guy and said his behavior was obnoxious.  The manager didn’t care, and when the guy resisted leaving, the manager said, “Look, right now, you’re only being asked to leave for the day.  Let’s not escalate this.”

The kid took the hint that he could possibly be banned for longer than the day, and very reluctantly picked up his chips.  He did say to the manager, “This is ridiculous, you kicking me out. You know how much I make for this casino every day?  Thousands of dollars.”  Hmm….trying to figure out how a guy who plays 1/2 NLH makes a casino that kind of money.

Anyway, he was very upset but he left without further incident.  I have to say, I didn’t think it was necessary to kick him out.  Move him to another table, yes.  Give him a “final warning,” sure.

I wonder if the fact that the waiting lists were so long had something to do with it?  Perhaps with a full board of players waiting for his spot, it was easier to just kick out the malcontent and give someone else his seat.  I dunno, I thought it was a bit extreme.

The older guy left not long after and was replaced by a guy in a white sweat suit. He was very friendly, talking to everyone, decent guy.  And a luckbox.  He played a lot of hands and seemed to hit many of them.  But I didn’t see anything that made him look like a maniac, he just seemed to be lucky. The clueless guy busted out by shove-bluffing air into a guy who had the nut flush.  He was replaced by a guy who was even more clueless.  Seriously, this guy looked like he’d never seen a deck of cards before.

So by now I was down to around $330.  Sweat suit guy had over $400.  The new clueless guy had bought in for $100 and somehow still had about $45 left.  And I got pocket Aces again.  I opened for $8.  The guy in the white sweat suit made it $37.  New clueless guy called.  He left about $7 behind so obviously he should have gone all-in, but as I said, he was clueless.  Back to me, and I put another $120 on top of the $8 already in front of me.  Does that seem like the right size bet?

Sweat suit guy asked for a count and then called.  Clueless guy put in his last few chips.  The flop was horrific: King-Jack-King.  I checked.  Sweat suit guy bet $100.  Back to me. I tanked.

That flop sure looked good for his range, right?  I mean, I figure he’s got JJ+, or Ace-King.  The only hand I can put him on that I beat is pocket Queens.  Reluctantly, I folded.

Since he was heads up with the clueless guy, he had to show his hand, which was of course, pocket Jacks.  Clueless guy had Ace-rag and figured out that he shouldn’t be playing poker and left.

Well, at least I made a good fold.  The guy asked me what I had and of course I said nothing.  But he knew what I had.  “Why didn’t you shove (pre-flop)?  You shove, I’m gone.  You gotta protect your Aces.”

I wanted to say nothing but I did let these words escape my lips:  “Is that a good way to get value?”  He repeated himself.  “You gotta protect your Aces.  You shove, I’m gone, I’m not calling a shove. But you only raised, what, $100? You know Jacks have been good to me.  That’s why I called.”

Well, sir, you never told me that you had Jacks or that they’ve always been good to you.  I didn’t know.  But if that’s the case, why wouldn’t you have called a shove?

He harped on it for awhile.  After the fifth or sixth time he asked me, “Why didn’t you shove?” I finally said to him, “I’m sorry, I didn’t realize you were that bad a player.”  Yes, I said that.  Of course, I said it in a joking way, at least I tried to.  He shut up but he didn’t seem upset.  Unfortunately, I may have gotten him to rethink his play.  I should have kept my mouth shut.

So apparently the purpose of poker is to protect your Aces, not extract as much money from your opponents as possible.

Later, he called a raise of mine and said, “You’re gonna hate me even more if I hit this time.”  I said to him, “I couldn’t hate you any more than I already do.”  Again, I made it clear it was all in good fun.

Remember how I started this post.  This situation was strangely similar to the one that happened at least a month later where the guy told me I should have bet more (or shoved) when I raised him on the turn with a full house.  But I swear, I didn’t think of this “protect your Aces” guy at the time.  And when I wrote that other post, I didn’t recall this story at all.  Otherwise I might have combined them.

Anyway, I played on, nothing too exciting happened after that, and booked a small win.  And apparently, totally forgot about “protecting my Aces” within a short period of time.

But now that I remember, I plan on open-shoving my entire stack whenever I get them again.

I mean, you gotta protect your Aces, right?

Thinking of hiring this Lady Cop to protect my Aces!