Some houses don’t allow you to use it, as he “goo” on the cards can jam shuffle masters.

Hand cream has been a no-no long before shufflers.

Most Annoying Player We Got asked me if I ever get sick of dealing. I think he meant to ask if it was monotonous, but everything he says has a negative slant, so "sick of" was his default choice of words.

I compared it to driving--you don't get sick of doing that, because you can do it automatically, without consciously thinking about it.

And then I bit my tongue, really really hard, to keep from telling him that the only thing I'm sick of is HIM. This guy embodies everything I'm sick of.
I'm sick of players chastising other players when they lose a pot.
I'm sick of players who can't understand why the waitress or chip runner doesn't show up within two seconds of being summoned.
I'm sick of players who can only talk about themselves.
I'm sick of players who put down everything and everybody, to feel superior.
I'm sick of players who are unspeakably rude.

And this guy who posed the question, checked every box.

(And don't think for a second this question wasn't about HIM--I'm sure the only reason he asked is because he's thinking of becoming a dealer. Given his self-centered personality, there's no other reason he'd ask. Last year he was boasting about all the money he was making driving for Uber. He doesn't do that any more, I think it finally hit him that that job costs a lot more than it seems at first.)

I signed up with Uber when it first became available in my region and it seemed to be a great deal at first. There were times when I couldn't wait for my dealing shift to end so that I could go out and drive for 5 or 6 hours before calling it a night.

Then they kept on hiring more and more drivers until the market became oversaturated. The dollar per mile rate went down. Surge zones don't pop up as frequently or for as long. So I hardly ever drive during my free time any more.

One good thing that Uber got right, however, was giving drivers the option to set a destination and only pair you with a passenger who's headed in your general direction. Now I'll frequently make myself available after my work shift ends and set my destination for home. More often than not, I'll pick up a passenger on the way and I'll make enough to offset my weekly gasoline bill and it only costs me an extra 10-15 minutes added to my commute home.

I tell folks driving Uber is like internet poker: "It was easy money for a while! But then..."

Sanity check:

You're dealing a 4-handed LHE game. As you start pitching, the button (Seat 2) gets up from the table, and walks over to speak to someone who is standing just beyond the other end of the table. In your room, the button is always dealt in (stupid forward-moving button rule), so you deal him in.

UTG has acted before you've even finished pitching the cards. Action is now on the button. You look to your right, and this guy still has his back to the game, chatting. It is important to note that this guy is no rookie, has been around the game for years.

What do you do?

A: Call out to him and tell him the action is on him
B: Kill his hand and move the game along.
C: Other

More often than not I'll go with A.

Depends...
Is this player someone who habitually slows the game down doing stuff like this?

B

Note that in the Galapagos Islands of poker that is Seattle, it's often considered a very grave matter if someone (not necessarily the button, any player) is dealt in who then doesn't show up to play their hand. I don't understand why; unless we think both that the dealer is a mechanic and the departed player is in cahoots with someone else at the table to change the order of the cards, they should just be random cards.

(My non-dealer opinion would be A if it's a friendly game and B if it's not, but neither should give anyone cause to complain.)

I'll try to call out to him while I'm pitching "Hey Jim, you want to play your button?" and maybe yell out one more time while action is on him, then kill the hand if no answer.

If it's a regular thing for him I'll skip ahead to killing it.

If I cant use a hand cream then how can I go about fixing this issue? Any advice?

I've noticed if I wash my hands during my breaks it helps but after a while my hands just get sticky n gross. Really messing up my pitch and it makes it sloppy at times.

Could you use hand cream at the beginning of your break and then make sure it's all worked its way into the skin or wash it off at the end of your break? (Sorry if I'm being Capt. Obvious here.)

Do you suffer from palmoplantar hyperhidrosis or something like that? (excessively sweaty palms)

Maybe this is something a physician could help with.

Well, I killed his hand immediately. Anyone who gets up two seconds before it's his turn to act, walks that far from his chair, and keeps his back to the game, is doing a great job of impersonating someone who has no interest in this pot that he has put $0 into.

After I killed his hand, the SB completed, the BB checked, I pulled in the bets, burned a card, and as I'm peeling off the flop, he arrives and is flabbergasted that I would mistreat him in this way.

"Sorry, pal, you looked like you weren't interested."

"Oh, I'm not interested in playing my button 4-handed?"

Whatever, I apologize and try to take the blame, even though I don't think I was wrong. And he *still* keeps running his mouth about it, like this is the gravest injustice ever perpetrated.

And now I'm getting hot. Because at this point, he's just piling on--and this guy works here!

The game broke a few hands later. I really wanted to talk to him about this away from the table, but he was gone by the time I got the table shut down. It was a few days before I saw him again. I tried to tell him how upset I was about him showing me up in front the players while I was in the box, but he wouldn't listen--he just wanted to talk about how *I* had wronged *him*. And to be honest, I wasn't listening, either. I wrapped it up with, "OK, let's say I'm wrong. Fine, I'll take that. But next time, even if I'm unquestionably 1000% wrong, don't talk to me like that in front of the players. You wouldn't want a coworker to do it to you--"

He interrupted again to talk about the last time instead of the next time, so I gave up.

I never had a problem with this guy before, nor he with me. Shrug.

B


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Don't sweat it. He's the problem. You can choose to let it bother you or you can choose to accept that he's a dickhole and not let it bother you.

So he's standing behind his opponents while they are checking their hole cards and he thinks he should have a live hand?

I would deal him in since he was there when I started pitching.

I'm gonna laugh at him and say "You abandoned your hand.".

That's all I would need to say.

OR the catch-all of.....

B all day, imo.

For clarity, no, he was not standing behind his opponents. He was behind three empty chairs, and he only went behind *me* to get there. At no time was he behind an opponent. He walked from 2 to 8, his opponents were in 4-5-6.

EDIT TO ADD: Interesting, tho, how a close vote turned into a landslide once I filled in the details.

If someone pushes forward their big blind hand in an unraised pot on a clear accident, do you guys give them a second to realize before swooping for the muck silently, say something, or do you swoop like it was any other hand? I usually give them a second, but don't say anything.

On a similar note, do you guys say showdown hands from the prior hand to other players if asked and you remember?

I don’t usually answer questions about showdown hands.

My personal preference in the big blind situation would be to wait a second before mucking. In my current room we are told to push it back.


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I totally didn't take this into account.
He's willing to play 4 handed and keep a game going?

I'm gonna tell him he has a hand.

I can think of a couple of players that would give me grief for even asking.

Depends on the player tbh, if it's someone who tips me, I will call them out by name and say it's on them. If it's someone who rarely or never tips, that hand is hitting the muck without warning as soon as it's on him. Certain courtesies are afforded to players who tip imo, this is one of those situations.