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Something’s happening
here, what it is,
ain’t exactly clear.
Dev.
Hults
The Poker Game
or
4 Hours With 7 Jokers
Editorial
By Evangeline Alburas
I was raised here in Clatsop County, so finding an unfamiliar setting
was difficult. I considered going to Annie’s, the stnp bar. That would
be shockingly unfamiliar, I have never been to a strip bar. I even
planned on the night and had invited some guys from work thinking
that would make the experience more bearable. Thankfully, one of the
invitees talked some sense into me; it was a bad idea to go to a strip
bar. However, every week a group of men get together and play poker,
so Darrin, one of my coworkers, suggested this as a possibility for a
strange and unfamiliar setting. Women rarely hang out to watch a
game, much less sit in on a game. And I love playing games, but poker
was a bit of a mystery. Does a four o f a kind beat a full house, or the
other way around?
They are a rather organized bunch of guys; Darrin, “the
Curmudgeon,” and “Uncle George” had started the weekly games and
had been playing poker every Tuesday night (give or take) for five
years. After much trial and error they had found the-magic seven who
could stand each other enough to play every week. They call
themselves the Thanatopsis Literary and inside Straight Club, “the
Western Chapter.” One of the Marx brothers played poker with a
group by this name, which is where the TL1SC came from. Damn told
me that at one time they even had business cards printed up bearing the
club's name. The location of the game rotates among the players'
houses. That week it was unceremoniously, yet appropriately, in a
garage.
I entered through a side door in the garage, which was unconnected
from the main house. The compound was nestled back in the woods
east of Cannon Beach and north of the R V Park. Some boys were
playing darts when I waltzed in. The garage was large and airy with a
concrete floor and a big, oil heater mounted on the ceiling which blew
out hot air. The walls were lined with shelves and the building housed
three big trucks. A table stood surrounded by three benches, which had
come from the old Bill's Tavern, and a couple o f chairs; a centralized
music system fed us The Bad Livers, Steve Earle, Billy Bragg, and
other acoustic tunes. A modest guesthouse with a large loft adjoined
the garage. The host’s house was not your usual bachelor’s pad, and
because all the players smoked, and occasionally spilled a beer, they
were relegated to the garage. I was worried that I’d be the only
woman, but was rescued by the appearance of Vicki. I noticed a few
things about the group as a whole: four of the men wore glasses, those
in glasses were all over fifty, the other three being under forty; four
men wore plaid, flannel shirts, and all seven smoked.
“Sasquatch” sat to my left; he had his white hair pulled back into a
ponytail, he wore red rimmed reading glasses, overalls with a plaid
shirt, and spent much o f his time rolling cigarettes. He drank Hamms’
Golden Draft, a new and exciting edition to the Hamms line.
“Uncle George” wore a vest, small round glasses, had a closely
shaven head and a five o ’clock shadow. He was amiable and smiled a
lot; he was also the only man who had a female sidekick. Viclri, my
female comrade, had come with “Uncle George” The two of them had
traveled two and a half hours to join in the game; “Uncle George”
commutes the farthest to attend the weekly soirees. “U.G.” split his
time between smoking, playing the game and being the whine sponge
o f his neighbor.
Sitting next to him was the “Curmudgeon”; he bitched, moaned and
looked to “U.G.” for sympathy and empathy. The “Curmudgeon”
coughed, smoked, spat profanities and hit those he could reach, all
between gulps o f Budweiser. He wasn’t a good winner, and he was
losing. He had an answer for everything, whether it was true or not.
His appearance was similar to the others: small round glasses and plaid
shirt but with jeans and Converses.
The “Professor” was the oldest participant, he had heavy square
glasses, a red nose and a Redskins sweatshirt that had been washed
many times. “Professor” was known for his jokes about quantum
physics that no one but “Uncle George” understood. Next to the
“Professor” was “Joey”; “Joey” was the youngest, full of gas and
youthful vigor. He wore a fleece vest, sweatpants with rubber boots,
had short hair and a jarring boyish laugh.
Then there was our “Host”, he was dressed in a dinner jacket and
comfortable loafers; he was affluent and clean cut. Our “Host” had just
bought a new truck, a big, white beautiful International to add to his
collection. Last in the rotation was Darrin, my coworker, dressed in his
usual shorts with Tevas and a plaid shirt.
Each player ponied up ten dollars, the chips were distributed evenly
and the cash stuffed into the empty card box. The “Host” stashed the
card box out of sight and started by dealing a game called seven card
stud, high-low. The dealer antes a blue chip worth fifty cents, basically
an ante for all the players; this is done every deal so the other players
don’t have to worry about anteing every game. It seemed like some of
the players didn’t like me being there at first, but with the aid of beer
(C on tin u ed on page 2)
Now & Then
Hey, Robe!!!
______ ____ WASHINGTON AND OREGON COASTS______________
2 0 0 1 Corrected for PACIFIC BEACHES
HIÔHjÀNÜÀRŸ T LÒWJÀNUÀRY
Ever been to a ‘cam y’, not a carnival, but a
‘cam y’? It’s a traveling show, much like the Gypsy
caravans in the old days. They com e into town and
they have games o f chance and fortune tellers and
all sorts o f strange stuff, and everybody knows that
it is rigged, dishonest, and a rip-off, but they still
go. There is a fam ous story about W ilson Mizner
confronting his brother Addison at a saloon in
Alaska where Addison is playing roulette, and
W ilson asks why he is playing when he knows the
wheel is rigged? “Yeah, but it’s the only game in
town,” was A ddison's answer. C am y’s are the
only game in town because they travel from small
town to small town, one step ahead o f the law.
They are a tight knit group o f folks w ho are running
a scam, or providing entertainment, depending on
how much you lost. Like m ost small groups they
form their own vocabularies. K ey words, codes,
like, “Hey Rube!” This is a shout that cam y’s use
to call for help, because things are getting out o f
control. I learned this term w hile working as a day
laborer tearing down a cam y in Baker, Oregon in
1968. A cam y troupe is usually no more than fifty
people, with maybe ten trucks and trailers with the
equipment and all. They hire locals in each town to
help them set up and tear down, usually different
people for each operation because they tend to try to
not pay folks. Oh, they’ll give you a check when
you are done working, but if you get to the bank late
the next day the odds are it w on ’t be good.
“Hey Rube” also happens to be the name o f
Hunter S. Thom pson’s new column at ESPN.com
every Monday. Y es the old doctor is back in print,
or at least cyber space, on a regular basis and as
rude as ever. His latest book is also on the shelves,
titled Fear and Loathing in A m erica: a collection o f
his often nasty letters to editors, writers, politicians
and other unsavory folks.
“ So, the point is?” I hear readers asking. The
point is that I have watched my beloved country
sold to the highest bidder. Again. I’ve watched a
coup, or more like a dope deal going down, a scam.
The fix was in, the m uscle was in place, the right
folks had been paid, the dogs had been drugged, and
the deal was going down. Just like watching the
mob take over Vegas in the old days. But, the
problem with the mob was the guys w ho figured out
the plan, eventually died. M eyer Lansky, the man
who bought Cuba and owned J. Edgar Hoover lock
stock and barrel, wrote, more or less, A m erica’s
foreign policy toward Cuba from 1950, when Castro
busted the deal, until Lansky’s death. Bush and his
OTTI
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better the fishing "
STANDARD TIME
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P
M TIDES
BOLD TYPE
Oh, no, no, no, how could they do it? Amazing
Grace is going to the Arizona rattlesnakes or some
team that never leaves their Spring Training Field.
That’s like trading Lou Geirig to the Washington
Spiders or something. Can Sosa be far behind? Oh,
w ell, that's the Baseball Business. A hundred
m illion here, a quarter billion there, its just money
and it’s just a gam e. Teams, a thing of the past,
now it’s corporations, fans, gone too, now there are
consumers in the bleachers. W hat’s next Extreme
Baseball?? Oh, Cubbies.
(C on tin u ed on page 2)
In 1555, Nostradamus wrote:
“Come the millennium, month 12
In the home of greatest power,
The village idiot will come forth
To be acclaimed the leader.
UPPER LEFT Eb6E JftWUftM 2.004