stevesbets

In an attempt to keep my blog fresh, I’m going to weave in serious posts like the last one with amusing anecdotes from my poker career, this post falls into the latter category.

When my freind’s and I first started playing in Stouffer (Our dorm at Penn), we all were interested in gambling and winning, but we also were all naturally different in our styles. We played very low limit with each other along with 2 4 full ring limit holdem at the Taj and on Pokerroom. Learning poker, like most things worth learning in life, takes practice, dedication and willingness to fail. Of the 5 of us that played the most, only one of us, let’s call him “Mitten” seemed remotely capable of winning. In fact, it got to the point where everyone of the rest of us owed him money (although all very small amounts of course). To this day I can’t be certain of the reasons for his immediate success amidst the wretched stench of failure all around him. Maybe he ran better, maybe his naturally tight and stingy inclinations were better suited for the full ring low limit games than the rest of our natural mentalities, or maybe he simply saw through the matrix in a lucid way that the rest of us did not.

Anyway, it got the the point where all of us owed Mitten some small amount of money. Mitten did not relish collecting debt from his friends who he felt a certain level of pity for due to our incapacity to win. One guy in particular, lets call him “Gaston” wanted to rid himself of the debt he owed (I don’t remember the exact amount but I believe it was around $150). Mitten offered an option in which we would all order food from a local hoagie place and Gaston would go to the bottom of the Stouffer stairs to pick it up from the delivery boy at the gate. Stouffer had an elevated patio that in part overlooked steps which headed down past the gate and to the street. At some point after paying for our food, Gaston would kiss the delivery boy on the lips. After that it was up to him, but if he did the kiss, his debt was cleared. I guess when you are a freshman in college, $150 seems like alot of money and Gaston agreed to this deal.

With an audience camped out on the patio with cameras in hand, Gaston descended to meet the delivery boy who rode in on his bike. After paying for the food, Gaston said as quickly as possible “Don’t kill me but this is for debt!” and planted a quick peck on delivery boy’s lips. The audience erupted in laughter as pictures flashed, I really feel sorry for the delivery guy in retrospect, he seemed astonished and pissed. Gaston ran up the stairs through the safety of the gate as quickly as possible. With no other real option, the delivery guy rode away.

It’s actually funny now how similar each of our tendencies are to those days when we all began playing, Mitten is still really tight, Gaston is still wild and unpredictable, and I am loose, calculated and often too terrible for my own good.