My Secret to Winning at Poker
I got invited to Sleezy & O-Town’s place this week for what promises to be a fun-filled multi table Texas Hold ‘Em smack down. I figure it’s because they know me to be a lovable scamp who digs a friendly card game among lovable friendly friends. What they don’t know…yet…is that I suck. Severely.
Seriously. When it comes to poker, I’m the equivalent of a retarded circus monkey hanging from a merry-go-round in your living room, tossing money in the air from a velvet & rhinestone sack. Go ahead, Doris! Catch the monkey’s money! It’s free! All freeee! Wheeeeee! Look at his shiny hat!
The few poker games I do find myself at consistently reveal that I’m far more hooked on the action than the ante. To paraphrase my boy Rands, you either love to play or you love to win. And, shit man, I just love to play. And watch folks play. But I’ll be a gosh dern derned if I can even remember whether a full house beats five of a kind.
It’s not that I don’t play a lot of poker. Well, actually it is because I don’t play a lot of poker. I’m a roulette guy. No skill. All luck. Sure, I’ll have another martini. Oh, is Dazzle you’re Christian name, or is that just for the stage? Of course I love your clear heels! Hmmm? No. It doesn’t matter. Just pick any five numbers and tell your buddy there to spin the wheel. Here. Take my credit card. I’m just here for the shrimp cocktail. And your hotel room key.
So, in an preemptive effort to lose less money this weekend and cry a bit less than usual the day after, I’ve been scoping online poker games to practice some before hitting my next real table. I’ve found a lot of pay-to-play sites out there. But the most fun I had was on a free online poker party site named, aptly enough, PartyPoker.net. You download a free desktop app that runs on OS X, take 30 seconds to start a free account an shazaam! you got 50 rooms to jump into. Hold ‘Em, Omaha, 7 Card and more. The crowd ranges from hardcore world series wanna-bes who were ready to rip my head off whenever I made a mistake, to casual but still skilled players like SillyKK & HuggyLuvs, who may have silly online names but nonethless taught me some cool stuff about the game. And, more impressibely, did so while engaged in a really funny conversation about unibrows, MC Hammer and automotive marketing. Who knew?
I think there’s also an members section where you can play online for real money for those who want all the risk of a casino without any of that distracting drugs, sex or free pancake buffets…but who cares.
Anyway, the rest of the site has plenty of info on strategy, etiquette and even a thing called the poker trainer which is pretty neat. So everyone go and sign up, hurry up and get a free education in playing poker. And the next time there’s a game amongst friends I won’t be the only one losing his shirt and loving every minute it.
DISCLAIMER: I am in no way affiliated with, own a part of or make any cash off of PartyPoker.net. I’m also not responsible if the entire thing is a scam aimed at stealing your grannie’s mattress money, or if any of their downloads lead to your hard drive exploding.
FURTHER DISCLAIMER: I’m just kidding about your name being silly, SillyKK. But HuggyLuvs…? C’mon, man. That’s just freakin’ creepy, dude.