Where things can get pretty igry ...Rick's Cafe Americain

With all of those caveats out of the way, I should set the scene.  A friend of Rick’s Cafe hosted a No Limit Texas Hold’Em tournament over the weekend.  $50 buy-in, with rebuys.  Winner take all.  12 players guaranteed a pot of $600, but five rebuys (including me) meant the winner would walk away with $850.  The level of play ranged from the awful to the mediocre. Although some players (including, sometimes, me) overrate their own ability it was not a very talented table, so it was no surprise that the winner was much luckier than she was talented.  But I wasn’t upset that I lost (really!) or that she won (really!) - but I did have something of a meltdown and I sort of stormed out of the apartment at the end of the game.  And it all comes down, ultimately, to etiquette - poker and otherwise.  If you can’t be bothered to care, all of a sudden I care a lot.

Act in turn.  Keep track of what the blinds are.  Make a note about the denominations of your chips; you shouldn’t have to keep asking.  When you are in the big blind, don’t throw in an extra bet unless you really intend to raise. If a misdeal is called, just redeal.  After you muck your cards you may not “take a quick look.” If you have thrown your cards away, don’t react (and especially don’t shriek) if the flop happens to improve the crappy cards you were dealt.  If you win a hand after a dubious call, show a little humilty.  Specifically, if you win a hand with a card on the river, don’t call your significant other from the poker table to giddily gloat when the person you beat is still sitting right in front of you.  (Incidentally, don’t do it even if you played with extraordinary skill.) And don’t, if you have a single drop of humanity in you, just don’t - when already taking the dubious step of asking the fallen to gather for a picture - say “I’d like to get a picture of all of the people I beat.”

Maybe I’m the crazy one, but I don’t get mad often, and I was steaming on Friday.  Two things made me feel better.  First, a cab driver was driving around at 2:00 AM with his “Off-Duty” light on.  He does this so that he can pull over, decide that he doesn’t want to go to Brooklyn, and say “I’m sorry.  I can’t go to Brooklyn - I am at the end of my shift.” So I was happy that he got tagged by a cop when he drove away after trying to pull that shit with me.  At 2AM.  In the freezing cold.  I hope it is an expensive ticket.

Now if you will excuse me, I have to go call our poker host and apologize for being something of a turd in the punchbowl; even if I feel my behavior was justified (I do) it is still poor form to act out at someone else’s house.