Maudie at PokerWorks

Contrasting our affable table captain of my Friday session, was an “I’m - so - superior - but - don’t - look - now - I’m - an - asshole” table-captain of Saturday night’s visit to the casino.

It was the first time in a while I paid back to back visits to the poker room, but I was feeling pretty good from the night before. Plus, I had been a good girl and had completed my day’s tasks, so it seemed an apt reward.

I ended up getting stuck for a wee amount, though - but, only needing to do a half-rebuy after misplaying a big pot. I couldn’t let go of my pocket jacks when everything was screaming that my opponent had hit a set of nines. I pushed and of course he called. I had him covered so I had some change left after losing the pot.

Later, the most knowledgeable player in the known universe deigned to sit at our table. I knew he was the most knowledgeable player in the universe by the way he’s scoffed. He was an Expert Scoffer which is the signature of the oh so knowledgeable, yes?

He was clearly amazed at how bad we were all and yet were pulling in the pots, snatching the bounty out from under his expert hands. I took a huge pot away from him with an A-J off - there were three of us in the pot and, honestly, if it’d been just us heads up I would have abandoned the hand on the flop. However, it’d given me some draws and the implied odds spurred me on.

As I scraped in the pot, he did one of those snort scoffs - the kind that intends to wither you on the spot to a clump of jellied goo. It almost succeeded, too, because I started to defend myself - to explain why I’d remained in the hand. I stopped myself just in time and stacked the remainder of the chips in silence.

Later, I initiated my derisive chuckle. I did this because I began to take note of the hands this genius thought worthy to play. First I noticed he was playing nearly every hand - limping in, rarely raising. Then I noticed he was expertly coming in with any two cards.

So - when he would scoff at a lost pot, I’d issue my subtle but derisive chuckle. A “phuh…,” if you will. A short expulsion of air over the vocal chords with a slight roll to the eyes and shift in the chair. Try it some time. It puts them on edge.

I’d zeroed in on him and was eager to take every one of his chips, but he opted to move to a table with some of his buddies. I stayed longer than I wanted to trying to get unstuck. Finally, with our table was dwindling, I accepted the loss for the session and made my way home.

I could almost guarantee, though, that the number of my chips that found their way to someone else’s pocket is far less than the chips Mr. Scoffer left behind that night. I’ve learned that the more they do scoff, or lecture us, the better it is for my bankroll over all.

Phuh…

This entry was posted on Tuesday, April 3rd, 2007 at 10:03 pm and is filed under Uncategorized.