There's a reason it's called a RIVERboat

I finally have something marginally worth writing about on my blog. Here goes.

So I am on my way home from business in Ottawa last Thursday night when my Air Canada flight is delayed 2 hours taking off for Chicago. Apparently the delay was for bad weather and not, as I initially suspected, for my bad judgement upon entering Canada. Bad judgment, you say, what could he possibly mean?

Well, let me start my tale with my semi-colossal poor judgement with regards to the Canadian border patrol folks. You see, I have been to Canada 4 times in the last 5 months for business, 3 of those times on an expired passport (I lost my good one). Every time the border folks were very jovial and forgiving. My luck ran out this time.

I had, in fact, a shiny new passport but I was feeling extremely cranky from lack of sleep the previous couple of days. I happened to draw the lady border agent practicing for a job at Ben Gurion airport (if you've been to Tel Aviv, you know what I mean). Anyway, she asked me one too many times "once again, sir, what kind of meetings are you here for?" (marketing meeting wasn't cutting it.)

"I'm actually here to plot the overthrow of the Canadian goverment", I said with my favorite shit-eating grin. Whoops, did that really come out of my mouth?

It had.

She pulled out the big, nasty stamper and a red Sharpie to boot and started assaulting my paperwork like a Mountie digging in to a Tim Horton's bag (click the link, baby, if you haven't been to Canada much).

"Did I just land 20 in the big house?" I asked.

"Please go to the immigration line" she intoned. "Pucker up, beeatch" was implied.

So I go to Immigration expecting the rubber glove and was pleasantly surprised to be greeted by the normal jovial border agents I am used to. "Marketing Meeting" sounded just fine to them and I kept my secret plans to liberate the Canadian people from tyranny of the Queen of England to myself. Now back to the riverboat...

I land in Chicago 2 hours late and am told upon exiting the plane that my connecting flight to SFO has left. I later come to find it has not left, but I am now way to far from the gate to make it (thank you very kindly, United-friggin-code-share-Air-Canada-dot-fucked). I accept my fate, experienced business traveller that I am, and wait fruitlessly for a seat on the next SFO flight. But all the while, a plan was hatching in my head.

I knew that there were poker rooms on the Illinois/Indiana border because of a certain blonde dealer I got to know during an exceedingly long loosing session at Binions in Vegas (see other trip report). With my handy-dandy Crackberry I tricorded the distance at a scant 30 miles from the airport. I'll just rent a car or take a cab. How much could this possibly cost me in cab fare, like $60? Done!

First I book my homebound flight. Thanks to the 4th of July weekend I cannot get a flight anywhere near the Bay Area on Friday. The best they can do is LA. It sucks, but from there I can grab a Southwest flight and get home. Sold.

So I go down to baggage claim and jump on the Hertz bus. They tell me "get the fuck off and jam your gold card up yer arse , there's no cars", well maybe it wasn't quite that harsh but it felt that way. Off to the cab line.

I hop in a cab with 2 other dudes driven by some guy who clearly just got out of a training camp in Pakistan. But he claimed to know how to get to Harrah's in Indiana and, apparently, where these other 2 dudes were going was on the way. At least I think he said that. It's entirely possible he thought I said I wanted to go to "Allah's" instead of "Harrah's", who knows.

After about $45 in cab fare we drop the other guys off and head for Indiana. At the toll both in East Chicago, Indiana, he has this exchange with the toll taker (who I must say, looked and sounded amazingly like Aretha Franklin's character in "The Blues Brothers".)

"Verzda Kazeeno?" he asks in something akin to Ack-Ack from "Team America".

"What?" says the friendly toll taker.

"VerzDA KAzeeNO?" he repeats changing up the emphasis.

"I don't know what you're saying" she says in her best multicultural awareness tone of voice. I think she would have said "fuck off" if she weren't afraid the van was packed with plastique.

"CASINO, HARRAH'S CASINO" I shout from the back.

"I dunno" she says.

The cabbie drives on. He gets on the phone and apparently the members of his cell also do not know where Harrah's is. Neither does anyone else in Indiana. This includes, in order:

• The bellman at The Horseshoe who at least informed me it was now Resorts International and gave me god awful directions towards it.
• The girl at the gas station who nicely gave me directions directly back to The Horseshoe (which does not have live poker).
• Anyone else at The Horsehoe a hotel apparently staffed by the victims of severe lead poisoning (have you seen Lake Michigan?)

I had Muahmar drop me off (that really was his name) and he now chooses to tell me it is FARE-AND-A-HALF from O'Hare. Holy-fucking-shit. The total bill is $150. At least he apologized for getting lost.

I must add one funny thing Muahmar did say to me, that was not quite worth a bone-and-a-half of cab fare. When I asked him if they had gambling here because it was Indian land he said "Sure, whole sztate. Indian-ah." Thanks, dude. That made my ride.

I went inside The Horseshoe and went through the rigamarole of getting another cab (they had a special line shared with 60 year-old women redeeming their slot card points). Thirty minutes later (it is now 1:25AM) my saviour arrives. How was I to know he would look exactly like one of those dudes you see fingered as a serial killer: tats-a-plenty, balding dirty blonde hair pulled into a pony tail, overweight, tat-riddled, nasty blonde girlfriend sitting next to him in the front seat. Straight out of a David Lynch flick, I swear.

I scanned the inside of the cab quickly for blood or other bodily fluids. Even the locks appeared functional. Good enough, I'm in.

The drive was unsettling. East Chicago Indiana looks like a cross between Blade Runner and Detroit. We wove in and out of huge refineries with giant flames belching from towers. With each backroads turn, I was sure my new cab friends were driving me to some bizarre mid-western serial killer palaver.

Fifteen dollars later, I arrived at Resorts. It's now nearly 145AM. I ask John Wayne Gacy, my cab driver, how long should I budget for the ride to the airport for my 10AM flight. He suggests a pickup time if 6AM. Damn, just 4 hours at the table now. We schedule a pickup; I am expecting Jeffrey Dahmer, except he's dead.

Into Resorts I go. It is a damn site nicer than "The Shoe". These "riverboats" are actually permanently docked 5 story high modern yachts. No paddles, no dudes that look like Mark Twain, just a hotel and a ramp to the casino. And po' folk. Lots. It's kinda sad.

Security is also oddly tight with metal detectors and a guard to eye you when you go in. I make no comments about overthrowing the government of Indiana; I am not anxious to meet the state goat.

The card room is located on the forth floor of the boat. You'd never know it was actually a vessel of any kind, it simply feels like a narrow, multi-floored casino. The cardoom packed in about 12 tables, 9 hold'em and 3 stud (I might be off by one or two). Nothing too unusual, decent tables (cloth, not felt), decent service, and- except for one amazingly bad one- good dealers.

They were spreading the following games:

• $5/10 limit hold'em
• $5/10 full-kill omaha (not going)
• $5/10 no limit hold'em ($200 min, $500 max)
• $1-5 stud

I opt for the $5/10 limit game. I am simply too beat to apply the concentration necessary for NLHE or stud. I am struck immediately by how loose the game is. Nearly 3/4 of the table is in on every hand. Doesn't matter if the pot is raised or not, everyone is in the pool.

The play is astonishingly bad. The only thing worse are my cards. Even good cards are going bad on the riverboat. Some sad stories:

• Pocket AA cracked twice by suckouts on the river after multiple check-raises by me. What sucked me out? Both times a 22-1 runner-runner flush by dickheads playing cards like 7-4 suited. I am not kidding.
• Flop the nut straight (and bet it HARD) only to have the river deliver a flush card. I knew that card was coming- I just frigging knew it. And the schmuck turns over K-4 suited that he played for a raise.
• From the BB holding Q8, the flop comes QQ8. I check my monster and the check goes all the way around. Turn brings an 8, now I have a set of 8s and a set of Qs. Of course, some one else has a Queen and we split the pot.
• I turn the nut flush, just to have some clueless old lady fill up her set with runner-runner pairs on the board.

I counted no less than NINE river suckouts against me in this 4 hour period. NINE! Normally I would have switched to NLHE at that point but I was really afraid I would not have cabfare. I just couldn't take that risk with the scary folken I had seen about.

I dropped about $225 in total (not including my funding of Moahmar's cause). I will not be back. [Not without $1000 and 2 days at any rate. These people sucked so bad it was just a matter of time and patience. Two things I did not have- I did end up playing far crappier cards than normal, just in desperation...]

The ride back to O'Hare was a more reasonable $80 with a very nice lady cabbie who was clearly not either a Satan worshipper or a serial killer. She was, however, a terrible driver. Every time I would fall asleep, she'd jam the brakes an bash my head against the plastic diviser between her and I.

I dunno, maybe I was being Punk'd.