Category: Notes from the Cage

I have retraced my steps in the windstorm. Sand and garbage blow down through the funnel of the Strip from its miserable northern mouth. The palms tremble and kick like the underskirts of its old chorus girls. Ugly sixteenth notes pip from wind on metal; invisible drums scratch rustle and thunder. Everyone struggling around me is a tourist: even the sun crusted families of the dry south, […]

I’m back home again – or rather, I have no home, I’m just somewhere else – and it seems, my mother may not have hers that much longer either. I no longer have the funds to pay her new and catastrophic debt, yet my sister has a spot for her in a future house. The world revolves and problems are solved unexpectedly. I appreciate, more than ever, […]

My mother does everything slowly. It’s not an affectation. She is old. There are things that don’t need to be done, however. Today, she’s taken the white meat off the rotisserie and placed it on a sheet pan in order to oven heat it. I’m reluctant to touch the so-carefully destroyed slices of chicken. I don’t want to sense the inevitably disappointing dryness, the futility and waste […]

The Russian isn’t really a Russian, just a local comic books guy who plays poker well and comfortably. He drinks and enjoys himself and loses his accent, if there ever was one. He likes to berate others, especially when they don’t play like he wants them to play; to hear his barbs is to hear a thin compliment; he uses laughter as a manipulative signal rather than […]

What a winter. After pulling out all the stops at the tables during a summer that featured more hours and daily discipline than I have summoned in years – even experiencing actual rungood during one extraordinary three week stretch – the door was shut hard on my slow return to form and financial strength. Of course, I stubbed my own toe and banged my own head on […]

Even to the patient observer, some things go unclarified and unrevealed. “That’s my wife,” the Georgian said. There was a tall, pale woman with mid-length hair on the rail. She was at the beginning of drunk: wet-eyed and smiling emptily. She was communicating confidence, and I didn’t think much of why she was doing that, not at first. Behind her, dozens of ladies and a few scattered […]

She was one of those Korean girls from the poorer segments: small, thin hair, no surgery. She wasn’t tall like the new rich or American ones that usually float the pricier parts of the strip – no spindling but muscleless ballerina body gift-wrapped in some off-rack evening wear send-up, all detail and no line. No, this one was hidden in layers of shapeless warm black. She wore […]

“You know, I could have sets there.’ Seat four, bearded and neat, was admonishing his equally bearded but slightly less neat opponent. Yes, it’s one of those tables… “Of course!” Messy Beard is affirmative.  “I’m trying to charge your overpairs and ace high, maybe ace queen.” …but on speed. We’re going to be talking “strategy” all night. “I can have some draws too,” Neat Beard continues, unasked. […]

Must be a tough spot. The fat guy is tanking– stuck in thought. Too much time. It’s ten big blinds, come on. Maybe it means a lot to him. Whoa, he calls. Well, that’s a funny two pair. Not sure I’d see that coming. Fat guy slams his phone on the table. Don’t take it so seriously, bro, it’s a small pot. Must be a tough spot. […]