Jumpers at a poker table.......

The other night, I decided to head over to the local casino to play some poker for a few hours. I went over there intending to play no-limit poker, but ended up in a limit game that was pretty juicy, so I just stayed in that game.

There was a player at the table who was on a monster run when I arrived. He had only been at the table for 45 minutes, but had won around $200 over that stretch of time. It quickly became obvious that he was a bad player who happened to hit a lucky stretch. This is always the ideal opportunity to make a lot of money if you're a player just arriving at the table. Wait for your spots and then jump on him when he overplays a hand. Unfortunately, I wasn't able to take advantage of it, but others were.

In one particular hand, he was dealt two cards as players always are. The second card hit his hand and accidentally flipped over, revealing the Ace of Diamonds. He was irritated about the whole thing and blamed the dealer. He was dealt a card to replace the exposed card. I was next to him and already out of the hand, so I peeked over to see his cards and saw that he had the Ace and Ten of Spades. I also noticed that the first card he received was the Ace of Spades, meaning that he would have had AA had that card not flipped over.

He put in a call to see the flop. The flop had three spades! This guy, thanks to a accident, had lost his aces, but ended up getting an ace-high flush in the process. He ended up getting around $100 in the pot because no one believed he had anything. The bad part is his reaction after that. He continued to complain after the hand that the dealer had screwed him because of the exposed Ace! He said he wouldn't tip her again for a winning hand as long as he was at the table. People were laughing, but then realized he was serious. Thankfully, through coincedence, the dealer switch was to occur after that hand, so the dealer moved on to another table and all was well again.

Later in the game, I was in a hand where a guy raised into me. I actually didn't have much, but as I often do, I wanted to elicit a response just to see what the other guy might have. I noticed that the guy was wearing a skydiving shirt, so I folded my hand while noting that I never trust a poker player who is crazy enough to jump out of a perfectly good airplane. He chuckled a bit, but I think he had a pretty strong hand as his response wasn't huge.

As the dealer is shuffling up for the next hand, a guy in his 70's next to me who I had been chatting with tapped me on the shoulder. He mentioned that he also jumped out of airplanes, though he did so as part of the 101st Airborne during the Korean War. I was intrigued and mentioned to him that I knew the 101st Airborne from the Normandy attacks. They were the group that jumped in behind enemy lines to knock out German gun emplacements. He was pretty impressed that I knew that. I guess he assumed that younger people didn't remember all that.

I told him that I had watched the entire Band of Brothers series, so I knew a lot about those battles. He said that most of his jump instructors during the Korean War were veterans of the battles during World War II that I watched on the Band of Brothers series. He said his jump instructor was the 4th person out of the plane at Normandy. That’s not an enviable position, as the Germans would open fire at first sight of a jumper, meaning the early guys got hit pretty hard as they came out of the plane. His instructor had many scars to show for his bravery. He mentioned that a lot of the recruits had a great deal of respect for their mentors since many of them had already fought in some tough battles. He said if the instructor said jump, you jumped without any questions.

As we chatted, a guy two seats down, also in his 70's, chimed in. He was part of the 87th Airborne and had parachuted in behind enemy lines in North Korea during the Korean War. The two old war vets started exchanging a few stories. The second vet didn't give any specifics on his experiences in Korea. He seemed like a really nice guy who didn't want to seem like he was bragging. He said he enlisted at 17 and was in Korea by 18.

The player with the skydiving shirt also chimed in. He was in the Army and he ALSO was a jumper, though he only did it during training. It was a lot of fun over the next hour or so as everyone talked about the guys and their service. Got to learn a lot about military jumping and it lightened up the mood quite a bit at the table, which is always good for cash flow.

I ended the night down around $50 thanks to a total lack of any real good cards, but it was a lot of fun and it was great to meet all the military vets and hear their story. Had I not made my probing comment, I would have never found out that I was sitting at a table full of guys that were crazy enough to jump out of a plane. Not only that, but they were willing to risk their lives for our freedom.