Called and Those-n

We mention below our success Sunday night in the National League of Poker Weekly Championship.  It began with a generic simple greeting we usually write in the chat box at the start of play: "Happy Sunday to all."  It led down this road....


Rembones:  not if live in Newtown !
Me:  Indeed. Praying for Newtown.
Dealer:  roadglide wins Main Pot ($2,960)
Rembones:  That won't help***

We sensed a resistance right away to anything related to God.  But in light of the bloodbath at a Newtown, Connecticut grade school, we realize some people want to talk through the issues involved.  So we continued:

Me:  What do you recommend?

Rembones:  Try our best to identify people like that BEFORE it's to late, and have mental health facilities ava

Rembones:  ilable for the mentally sick***

We have no objection to that.  And as an aside, we realize some readers of this poker blog might have a different kind of "sickness" without realizing it.  If you're addicted to gambling to the point where it's affecting your relationships and life, help is available.  But back to the table....

Me:  Sound ideas.

Me:  But in the meantime,

Me:  praying for God's comfort

Me:  on survivors can't hurt.

Rembones:  You also need to accept the FACT that you can never design the laws around the extreme exceptions in

Rembones:   society !

Me:  True. Cain killed Abel.

Me:  Long before there were guns

Me:  and bombs.

Our last post offered the thought that Satan affected Cain's thinking in Genesis 4....

But each one is tempted when, by his own evil desire, he is dragged away and enticed.  Then, after desire has conceived, it gives birth to sin; and sin, when it is full-grown, gives birth to death. - James 1:14-15

So Rembones's ideas seem to have a proper direction.  Until....

Rembones:  hey will ALL be ***ll of dog *** !

Dealer:  roadglide wins Main Pot ($17,920) with Flush, ace high

Me:  Part of that was

Me:  censored.

Me:  But judgment is coming

Me:  for all of us.

Rembones:  Oh boy, we have one of THOSE people at the table !

Yes, a believer's words can give himself away.  But come to think of it, that will be part of the basis for God's ultimate judgment:

But I tell you that men will have to give account on the day of judgment for every careless word they have spoken.  For by your words you will be acquitted, and by your words you will be condemned. - Matthew 12:36-37

Jesus said these words, which should make us all think about ours.  What are you saying?  What are you writing online, for that matter?  Are they words of good, or of evil (verse 35)?

Clearly Rembones didn't think too "good" (pardon our English) of us, or "those people"....

Me:  Those? :-)

Rembones:  The goof***ball bible beaters !!  What a goof !!

Me:  I don't beat it.

Me:  I simply believe it.

Rembones:  Like I said***........ GOOF !...

Admittedly, some fired-up preachers do pound on the Bible to make their points.  For best results, we recommend opening the Bible.  Read what it says.  Then live by what it tells you to do.

Then I will answer the one who taunts me, for I trust in your word.... Your word is a lamp to my feet and a light to my path. - Psalm 119:42, 105

We were facing a bit of taunting at this moment for our beliefs.  But instead of responding with more name-calling, we wrote this....

Me:  So what is your hope

Me:  beyond this life?

Rembones:  We DON'T need any of the goofy superstitions, just common sense !

That didn't really answer our question.  Here's the answer we find in Scripture:

....A faith and knowledge resting on the hope of eternal life, which God, who does not lie, promised before the beginning of time.... - Titus 1:2

Me:  What's your common sense

Me:  explanation of what's

Me:  beyond this life?

After asking the question again, Rembones may have had enough of us.  He went all-in with K-A, as mentioned in the earlier post.  We had pocket Queens, and eliminated him from the tournament.

Dealer:  flopblogger wins Main Pot ($18,740) with One pair, queens

Me:  Do think it over, friend.

We encourage you to do the same thing.  If God's promise of eternal life is "superstition" or somehow not good enough for you, what's your alternative?  Is it really better?

Rembones left the table with no further comment.  But another player observing all this brought the discussion to a close:

petebiz:  I guess we will never know

Me:  Maybe not in this life. :-/

Of Alcohol and Aces

"May the angels of heaven smile down on you, in the game you're about to play." Those may sound like strange words from a poker tournament director. But this weekend, he wanted us to eliminate someone he considered a pest.

We were already in the loser's bracket of a heads-up tournament, after losing our first match. Now we had to play a young woman who openly admitted she was drunk and was being annoyingly confrontational with some people. "I want nothing to do with a drunk-a** woman," the director declared at one point.

"Do you believe in angels?" we asked the woman who heard the director's blessing.

"Yes, I do."

Yet the woman was drinking -- and telling people about how she "chopped the prize money" earlier in the evening at a regular poker tournament in the next city. "I may be drunk, but I know what I'm doing," she told us as we started to play.

"I haven't been this drunk in a long time," our opponent declared. Then, perhaps because we were a listening ear and not talking back, she explained what was behind it. "I'm feeling heartbroken right now." It was emotional pain for a female friend, whom she said was being treated badly by a boyfriend.

"People think they know all about me," the woman continued. "But they don't know what's in my heart."

Then our opponent switched the talk to poker -- and we failed to offer our thoughts on what she was going through. First of all, God knows what's in her heart. And what He knows might disappoint her....

The heart is deceitful above all things and beyond cure. Who can understand it? -- Jeremiah 17:9

The woman's heart may have convinced her she needed alcohol to cope with a friend's pain. But the angels she believes in probably would offer an alternative approach.

Do not get drunk on wine, which leads to debauchery. Instead, be filled with the Spirit. -- Ephesians 5:18

God's Holy Spirit is a comforter with far fewer side effects than "Southern Comfort."

Praise be to the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of compassion and the God of all comfort, who comforts us in all our troubles, so that we can comfort those in any trouble with the comfort we ourselves have received from God. -- II Corinthians 1:3-4

We prayed at the end of the night that this woman might come to know the comfort which God offers. It's even less expensive than shots at a bar.

Oh -- you're wondering how the game ended? We went all in for 2,500 with pocket Aces. The opponent who kept saying she "didn't care" called with Q-4. Then she hit Q-4 on the flop, and a 4 on the turn for a full house.

Yes, we lost to a drunken woman (who we think deep-down wasn't quite as drunk as she sounded). We went home humbled. Poker can do that to you. May she learn that lesson, too.

Poker Night 110 (UPDATED): Quadzilla

When was the last time you had made quads at a poker table? It could have happened to us Wednesday night at Soho Bar and Grill -- not once, but twice.

It was part of a night where we finished tied for fourth place, out of more than 40 players. After an early escape when we topped an opponent 8 of spades for a flush with a 9, the first big moment of the night came....

BLINDS: 50/100

IN THE POCKET: 8-8

It's a full table, and several people call. We choose to limp.

ON THE FLOP: 9-5-5

A woman to our immediate right is first to act, and bets about 600. "Get out of my pot," she warns with a bit of humor. Not with two pair, we won't. We call, as do a couple of others.

ON THE TURN: 8.

With a full house, we're certainly not getting out now. The woman seems to smell trouble and checks to us. We bet 2,500. A man who was moved to our table only one hand before calls, and the woman bails out.

ON THE RIVER: 8.

On the night the World Series ends, the runners come home to score! But knowing the house rules for Big Dog Poker, we have to check to assure a quad bonus.

A man to our left later says he caught us noticeably squirming at this point, and figured we had quads. Looking back on it.... yeah, our posture changed a bit at the turn. We knew we had a big-time winner. Around poker pros, that would be a "tell" which could cost us big profits.

But the man across the table apparently doesn't notice this, perhaps because he just sat down with us. So he bets 8,000.

"I'll call," we say. "And this is a $5,000 call, because I've got quads." (We kept a level voice at that point, instead of shouting and jumping around like we just won a TV game show.) Our opponent never saw that coming.

The second quad chance came in the second hour, when we had a 5 and the flop was Q-8-5. A woman across from us went all in -- and fearing she had two pair, we folded. Yet when the dealer played out the hand, the turn and river were 5-5. Ouch, that hurts.

Suffice to say it was a night when we hit big hands several times. In one case, we had the Queen of spades when A-K and two other spades hit the board. The "nut flush" let us eliminate two other players.

We took 100,000 chips to a nine-player final table -- but big blinds ate away at our stack, and we finally had to go all-in with A-4. A young man wearing a New York Yankee hat had K-K, and no Ace came to bail us out. Yes, we did the proper NYY thing at the end -- declaring: "Thaaaaaaa Yankee wins."

MINISTRY MOMENT: We showed our "Jesus as your savior" coin to a retired veteran at our immediate left early in the evening. He had trouble reading the message for a moment, then eventually said he agreed with it.

This man had recently spent time in a V.A. hospital for a heart problem -- so we reminded him of the comfort Jesus can offer. See II Thessalonians 2:16-17 for more about that.

UPDATED POKER SCOREBOARD: 46 final tables in 110 nights (41.8%) - 10 cashes. We've now played at Soho five times, and made the final table twice.