Easy Money

First off, can I say, "Sea-Ha-Who?" I am now officially ashamed to be a Pacific Northwesterner. Hey, at least the Storm brought home the WNBA title!

Yes, it was rough going in the NFL front, but it was some smooth sailing on the money at home front. The weekend was unexpectedly beautiful for this late in October; and after spending most of Saturday sorting through boxes in the garage, we put up Yard Sale signs and attracted the flocks on Sunday. Got rid of a lot of junk and made a $250 profit in the process. Can't beat getting paid for cleaning out your garage.!

Funny how people construe a Yard Sale as an invitation to be able to freely roam about your property. We have our tables of 'antiques' set up and the larger ticket items out the driveway, in obvious "to sell" piles, yet people walk right past it all and into the garage asking if those bikes are for sale, or making offers on the shelving that's holding all of the yard tools. WTF? And there's always a few folks who you could never in a million years imagine being ones to scavenge around in a trash can, yet they seem to find their way to the side of the house where I've piled up obsolete junk we were going to toss. And there they are, digging through boxes of crap that the dog chewed up, trying to find that one hidden treasure so they can offer me a quarter for it. Shoot folks, if you want that stuff that badly, feel free to take it. It'll save me from having to take a trip to the dump.

Now that our garage isn't just a storage unit anymore, we'll be spending the week converting it into a little walk-through Haunted House for the kiddies at Halloween. Our neighborhood is notorious for the Halloween decorations - one guy even sets out a fire-breathing dragon on his lawn! I'll post pics if I remember to take them.

We spent our usual Sunday night at the Midway. Shawni finished 3rd in the Vegas Freeroll. She was middle stack, about half of the leader, and 3rd place only had enough for 2 or 3 more blinds. Her K4 hit trip 4s on the Flop so she went all-in. Chip leader called and rivered a Straight to knock her out. Short stack was blinded out 2 hands later. She's done a lot better against the players at Midway than I have, so props to her. She finished 4th last week, so only two more weeks and she should be 1st!

I didn't play in the Freeroll this week cause I had to chauffer Shawni's mom to the Casino a little bit later. We had talked her into coming to the Midway to play in the Pai-Gow tournament. It's free, and if we can take up 3 seats for the family and increase our chances of being in the money, why not? Gave her a crash-course in the game, and brought her by just in time to see Shawni bust out of the Vegas Freeroll.

Drew our seats for the Pai-Gow tourney - the wife and I were in Round 1 and Mom was in Rd. 2 which gave her a chance to watch us play first. Shawni couldn't keep up with the others at her table, so she was out and went back to the Poker room for some 3/6 action. I advanced and then watched Mom play and coached her a bit. Some dealers don't like others coaching the players, but the one at this table didn't seem to mind, and I tried to keep it as subtle as possible. With some well-timed bets, Mom was able to jump into 2nd place by the final hand and advance to the Semis!

As we were waiting around for the Semis to start, a few of us joked about splitting the $1000 prize pool amongst the 16 semi-finalists. $60 for getting through the first round, yeah! But we played on, and I got lucky on my last hand. The chip leader at the table didn't bet enough to keep up with me if I won my hand, which I did, so I advanced to the Final table of 6. Mom didn't make it, but she was proud of the fact that she did lead her table for a few hands and others were betting big to try and catch up with her. She'll be back next time for sure!

The final 6 consisted of a couple of us that had initally joked about chopping the prize pool. But now it wasn't a joke. Now it was $166, free money. The normal payout is $600/$300/$100, but we all agreed to just take the $166 and spare ourselves the last 1/2 hour of playing. Hell, some of us were ready to go and put most of that money back onto the Blackjack table! We had to do a lot of convincing for one older lady, who's response was finally, "Whatever." After about 10 minutes of waiting for the Pit Boss to come back with all of our money, he showed up empty-handed and said the lady changed her mind and we had to play.

Fine. Be that way. The other 5 of us agreed to split whatever money was won between us, so if we could keep the deserter down in 4th place, that would be $200 each. As you can imagine, there were a number of not-so-subtle remarks made at the table. "Hmm, I probably shouldn't bet so big... wouldn't want to fall out of 3rd place!" Luckily, she was seated at one end of the table and not between any of us. Unluckily, I was seated next to her. Luckily, I'm a nice guy and kept my mouth mostly shut. That, and I didn't have an urge to get unexpectedly back-handed. At one point, she piped up, "Ok I get it, why don't you all just shut up?" When she finally busted out on the 2nd to last hand, there was quite a cheer from the rest of the table.

The cash was laid out on the table and split 5-ways. We all pitched in $20 for a total of $100 toke for the tournament dealing crew. Hey, $180 for 3 hours of playing cards isn't bad. Sure, I would have liked the $600 better, but it was a nice, fun group of people - and it was GUARANTEED money. If I make it to the final 6 again, I won't be the one to suggest a chop-chop, but I won't be the one to say No to it either.

So with the Yard sale, the Pai-Gow money, and Shawni leaving the 3/6 game up $100, we made over $500 on Sunday. Easy money, gotta love it!