Feb – March Poker & Trip Report~ Ep #1

Friday, the 25th 2022: Flynn spent 9 hours solo in Angry Bird driving from Home to Redding, CA. It was a beautiful drive, below freezing for most of it, yet sunny with blue skies and gorgeous views.

(The pix kinda blows cause it’s tough to take photos with a cell phone while driving in a vehicle at 80mph with tinted windows. But, you get the idea of the niceness of the day.)

As he hit Redding earlier than antipated (speed limits be damned, traffic was light, and the CA agriculural inspection station was once again unstaffed for passenger cars), Flynn whittled down the poker options from 1 to 1. They served food, with a decent looking menu, so he figured he would hit both needs at the same time. The website said they spread 2/5 and O8 4/8 limit on Fridays, which is the perfect option for Flynn.

Off he went. The first tip that this was not going to be super Wynn-like experience was the name: Casino Poker Club. The editor had to bold italic it so you wouldn’t miss it. The name gives one the impression of some dark back alley not-so-legal smoke-filled room, with Bruno guarding the door. Turns out the location was normal for a non-casino local poker room: in a strip mall type location ~ but not in a strip mall. The rest was pretty much true. Okay, no Bruno, no smoking by law, but getting in the door meant hoofing it through the employees out back having a smoke break. The joint was dark inside, with dark red felt. No one was wearing masks, so I guess in CA that is not a rule? No clue. There were two ‘casino’ (blackjack?) tables, and 4-5 poker tables. Only 1 table of 2/5 was going, no list for anything else.

Flynn was welcomed by the floor, got his name first on the list, and asked for a server to be sent over so he could order some food. Floor gave Flynn a menu, said she would be right there, and went back to his flooring duties. In the meantime, Flynn positioned himself at a vacant table to scope out his competition. All males, most older than Flynn, several without teeth, dirty nails, and most all seemed to know each other (such a suprise). Several were drinking. This should be a juicy game! One player who I shall call Bullhorn was in the 1 seat with stacks and stacks of red chips. He was very loud, and very aggressive. Clearly the two seat would be the place to be (position and all), but dayamn, he was loud. Anyway, as Flynn sat there waiting for the server to show up to take his order, he secretly hoped to NOT sit in the two seat, as flamingos have very sensitive ears.

20 minutes later, a seat came open, not the two seat! Yay! oh, wait..never mind. The person in the two seat COULD NOT seat change fast enough. So, yep, Flynn was seated next to Bullhorn. Sucks, but at least position, right?

This place was so weird (how weird was it?, you ask), that when the floor asked how much $ Flynn wanted as he was being seated, Flynn took a look at what stack sizes were. With the exception of Bullhorn, most people had between 1 – 4 red stacks and 1-2 blue stacks. Flynn thought this was a tad odd for a 2/5 game, but what the heck, he could get in cheap and see what transpired. He bought in for $300. It was not until the first betting round came around that he was able to see that the blue chips were $20. Well, shit again. Who does that? $1 chips are either blue or white, we all know that. To make it even weirder, the $1 chips were pink. Pink??

The next hour or so was spent either sliding back from the table or covering ears. Straddling was in full force from any position, the bets were huge, and calls were light. This would have been a fabulously juicy perfect game except for two things: Bullhorn and the absolulte deadest of cards, mostly 9-3. Flynn finally got to move after an hour to another seat, so at least that part of the pain was alieved. Still Nada. Flynn supposes this is sort of a blessing, as he got to sit there for a good 2+ hours with $300 and watch the antics before finally shoving what was left (140) with 88, and losing to a jack-off (not Bullhorn). If Flynn had been running good, or at least ‘normal’ , he would have added to his stack early on, but there was flat out no reason to. Either double up or go home was crystal clear after the first 30 mins.

A couple of the players were moderately friendly (smiled at Flynn), and only the floor even attempted to make Flynn feel welcome when he gave a dealer a break. The rest of the time, the dealers (very competent) just chatted with the locals. The server came around to bring more drinks to the locals who were ordering, but never came to take Flynn’s food order or even made eye contact.

Busting with his best hand of the night, Flynn cried all the way back to the hotel (stopping for take-out, obviously). Pfft Nope, gotta feed the fish once in a while, and might as well get the bad outta the way beforey LV. Plus, Ollie who played locally at home, made $300 so we will call it break-even in the family.

Off to see other family for a few days before hitting LV, so likely no updates until the 2nd of March.

Fin

Flynn