"Did you see...?" (Non-grumpy content)

Hilton, Sunday evening. Very drunk guy joins the fun. He keeps telling us two things, over and over again. First, this is his first time playing. This was a flagrant lie, based on his facility with handling chips, his familiarity with procedures (e.g., complaining about players folding out of turn; knowing about "buying the button," etc.), and so forth. His second claim was that he had been drinking a lot. Of that there was no doubt.

Occasionally during a deal a card will wobble in the air and possibly be exposed to players, or hit somebody's hand or chip stack and partially (or completely) turn over. On one hand, this guy's second card did something like that. I didn't see it, but the dealer (Kelly) saw the card, and was just about to replace it, as per the usual procedure--because if she saw it, probably somebody else did, too. But the player said that he didn't see it, and nobody else volunteered having seen it (I believe, and would like to think, that most people are honest enough to speak up if they saw a card partially exposed).

While the dealer was trying to decide whether she needed to replace the card, the drunk guy who received it looked at his cards, then loudly asked the dealer, "Did you see the ace or the nine?"

I couldn't help laughing. It was the funniest thing I've heard in a poker room in a long time. Kelly tried--without much success--not to laugh.

Now, some people in that situation would cleverly make such a comment as a deliberate piece of misleading information, then play their pocket fives (or whatever) against a confused opponent. But this guy bet the flop, which had two hearts, and, when nobody called, turned over the ace and nine of hearts. I think he was just too drunk to think up a good lie on the spot.