The one where I bust the jerky drunk lawyer

Since I'm on a poker roll, and there's some interest in these stories...  The next one will be a hand I lose, just to show I don't always win

The scene: it's late and I'm about ready to go home, however, I've just played my blinds (forced bets) and my button, so I figure I'll wait until either the blind comes around again or the next dealer sits down. (aside: at the no limit games, you pay the house a set amount every half hour instead of the house taking money from each pot, so generally you get a lot of people leaving on dealer changes) I'm sitting in the cutoff position (2nd best position - to the right of the dealer button), and I have 67 off suit.  There are 4 limpers (people who just call the big blind, no raising), so I throw my $5 in and get in for cheap.

The flop comes down 6h 8s 9h.  This is a spectacular flop for me. I have a pair, plus the open ended straight draw - it's a big hand.  Jerk Lawyer (who we will refer to as JL in the future) is first to act and bets $25 (into a $25 pot, which is stupid on its own, but that's another story), gets a caller in middle position, and I raise $50 to make it $75 total to go.  I have a big hand, and but would prefer to take it down now, because maybe I don't make my hand.

JL moves all in as his response.  Middle position caller folds.  I look at his chip stack and instead of being neatly stacked up in $100 stacks, it's a random jumble of checks, so I ask him how much he has.  He picks up about $50 in chips and begins counting them out individually. Oh my damn, how annoying.  So, since the dealer wasn't doing her job and asking him to just push his chips in so she could cut them down, I have to say, "Can you have the dealer count your stack down?" and JL snottily replies, "Just because your knickers are in a twist doesn't mean you have to be snitty." Geeeeez.  I tell him I'm not being snitty, I have a big decision to make and I need to know what he has, as this factors hugely into the decision.

The dealer finally cuts the stacks down and it turns out to be $444, compared to my $650.  This is, unfortunately, way too big of a bet for me to call, and I have to muck my hand.  JL then says, "Well, at least I know how much money I have now!"  I tell him, that no, actually he doesn't.  The dealer then smiles, and says, "Here's the pot."  I think, "Yeah, you jerk, you have $444 plus the amount in the pot." 

Then he starts stacking his chips up into random piles again (aside: I totally hate this. I am absolutely anal about people and their chips and it's a big thing in NL to know how much your opponents have), but on top of that he is stacking his green ($25) chips randomly in with his red ($5) chips.  So, again, I'm going to have no freaking idea how much money he has. 

I say to him, "Well, while I'm in bitch mode, I need you to put your big checks out in front so I can see how much you have."  The dealer makes a comment that I'm right and he has to put them in front.  JL then says "You're right, you are being a bitch but thank you for telling me what I need to do."

Cripes.  Did I mention I was SO READY to go home?  Now I frickin' need to stay and clean this guy's clock.  Sigh.

So, for the next two hours, he cannot stop from calling me names.  Random things like, "Oh, what's the bitch doing?"  and "Oh, is the bitch in?" and "Oh, you are such a poker goddess, is that how you play poker?" and "I'm going to go home and tell my daughter about you so when she plays poker she's just like you."  It's to the point where the dealers are absolutely flabberghasted, because to be honest (and I'm truly not being egotistical here), I'm one of the nicest people in the casino and I always treat the dealers with respect and rarely lose my temper and bitch people out, so they're just stunned that someone is treating me this way.  It was good to feel loved, but I was afraid that one of them was going to reach over the table and get this guy ejected and trust me, I was extremely okay with this guy calling me names and letting his ego get in the way.

NB: Ego is most of guys' downfall in poker, that I've noticed.  That, and believing that girls can't play poker.  I try and encourage this mode of thinking as much as possible.

So, then he gets on this thing after two or three more jack and cokes, where he's saying 'If she raises, I'm going all in'.  And then he says that across the table to me for about a half an hour: "If you raise, I'm going all in!"  This actually pisses me off a bit, because it cripples my game.  Unless I have pocket aces or pocket kings, I can't call an all in raise pre flop - he's got about $750 to my $1200 at this point.

So, JL is in the big blind, there's one limper and I'm on the button and look down and see the King and Jack of clubs.  Crap.  This is a hand I would raise on, especially on the button, but I can't because I know JL will push all in and I can't call that bet.  Sigh.  So, I throw my $5 into the pot, the SB calls, and JL looks at his hand and raises it an extra $25 to make it $30 to go.  Well, I can certainly call that, as that's about as much as I was going to raise.  His raise gets out the two other limpers, so it's heads up, me and him, and I have the positional advantage.

The flop comes down: 7c 5c 2c.  Yes, that's right, I now have a King high flush - the second nut (only thing that can beat me is an Ace High flush, and I can't put him on this hand because the odds of him having 2 of the remaining 9 clubs are very very small).

JL looks at me and asks, "Is it just you and me?"
I say, "It looks that way, yes."
JL smiles and says the three sweetest words I could possibly hear, "I'm all in"
I reply, "Reeeeally?" And then I check my hand to make sure that I have two clubs, and then check the board to make sure that yes, there are three clubs there, too, and say sweetly, "I call."  And flip over my KJc to the "oooooohs" of the table.
JL looks, and flips over his 7h 4h.

Yes, that would be top pair, crappy kicker that he pushed in on.  With a flush on board. The only way he can win is to get running 7s, running 4s or a 7 and 4.  Pretty slim.

The turn is a K, which means he's now drawing dead, and all his money is MINE.  To make things sweeter, as the dealer is flipping his cards over to show his hand didn't win, he asks, "So what happened, did I win?"  The dealer, one of my favorites, says, "Oh no honey, she has a flush," and pushes the $1500 pot my way.  I think if it wasn't terribly impolite, the whole damn table would have stood up and cheered.

And damn if I didn't give that dealer the biggest tip of my life (a green chip) because that was too precious of a hand to not acknowledge.

Turns out the next dealer was coming in right as the flop was coming up so he'd seen the whole thing.  Later he tells me that 'It's good to see that happen that way.' When I ask for clarification, he says "You know, when the one who's doing the annoying gets busted by the person he's trying to annoy."  The dealer who had dealt me the hand came up to me the next day (this was a weekend) and said "thank you SO much for the tip! I couldn't say anything yesterday, I tried to but you were in a hand, and we're supposed to be impartial, but I was so happy to see you take that jerk out."  I love being a regular that the staff likes. :)

And for those of you interested in playing poker:  don't ever let your ego come to the poker table with you; it will only get you in trouble.  You can bring your self-confidence, that's necessary, but leave the ego in the car.