POKER AT HOLLYWOOD--TUNICA

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After supper I decided to play a bit in Hollywood. Located next to Sam's Town in Tunica this casino is small and more low scale. My kind of place. Also I enjoyed the collection of film displays. Here was the car used in the Back to the Future movies and many small case displays of old Western guns and costumes. They did not photograph well, but I enjoyed this museum like esperience.

THE POKER

The poker started really bad. After overplaying my pocket kings to anothers pocket aces and staying with them way too long given the board, I was down $90. A couple college girls joined the table and they sparked the game. These "kool aid" faces, as the dealer called them, did not really play well. They were used to tournament play and bet into higher hands.

Also, the cards just came for me in a way I had not experienced this trip.
My strangest hand was 7-3 of diamonds on blind. A guy in early position raised with K-K and by the time it got to me everyone was in for $6, so I tossed on my other $3 just to see the flop.
Diamond draw.
Most dropped out but pocket kings bet until one of the girls started taking the lead. I just called.
I was the only one with the flush. Very nice pot.

More skillfully played was a 6-7 blind that flopped a straight. Another guy was betting, and although was was second to act, I let him and then raised it when it came around on the turn, trapping another fellow. They called me and one called my river bet as well.

J-8 on the blind got me a jack on the flop. The guy to my right did not bet his pair of kings on the turn and on the river came my jack.

When I left I was up $166, my biggest single session win for this trip and a nice way to leave Mississippi poker.

Also, this game taught me that finding games where people play a bit badly and can't figure me out is what I need to do to win consistently. Also these college girls were a breath of fresh air after so many experiences with gumpy old men. I have liked meeting and getting a sense of the men of the South, but I'd rather have a cute little Arkansas girl next to me bantering with her friend, flirting with the younger guys, kidding us old fellows into having a bit of "sex ont he beach" with her. They add the party and that is what I like in Vegas. More than the poker, I like the party.

I have had a fine trip and expect a few more fun days before I am home again, but Tunica is just a bit too quiet for me. I wonder if I will feel that way about Laughlin as well. Perhaps I need to concentrate on El Cortez and the strip casinos and just watch the games a while so as to stay away from the maniac betters.
Also, youth has an energy which I have missed since leaving teaching. I don't really want to be in charge of focusing that energy on disciplined activity anymore. That may change, but for now I want to enjoy the party that youth knows how to create.
For every funny old man at the poker table there are five who are gumping about their cards, about their illness, about the gov'ment, and reporting on the last visit to the doctors or the funeral of some friend the table knows.
Poker keeps at by the thoughts of my own death. The game of it is distracting and a way to practice metaphorical death.
But a fine party of happy young folks who I do not have to discipline is delightful.
And I do get to teach sometimes. This night I taught the craps table because it came up in conversation. And folks appreciated what I knew about it, valued it, and thanked me. Being able to teach without the need to control is delightful.
And when some kid is a bit of an annoyance, well, there is always the poker game in which to seek revenge. However, most of the time I find that I am doing that against gumpy old men.

This aging is not fun. I always remember Aunt Dorothy says with dripping irony as she faced one trouble after another:
"These are the 'golden years'"
However, I have been very lucky. I have health and a bit of money to spend. I have no complaints.
I am getting grumpy myself. I feel it. I feel how I am less a resource to my children and more an annoyance as I approach the age where they begin to parent me and worry I suppose that I'll be a burden one of these days or have the gall to up and die and leave them without a parent.
Elizabeth has taught me that when we die, other people get mad at us.
I don't much like it when people are mad at me, but if most of that could hold off until I am actually dead, I'd sure like that.
well, anyway, it was a good night of poker.