Her poker face

(Shout out to the guy who gave the lecture at the Tribune about SEO headlines)

Last night we found ourselves in the somewhat surreal situation of playing poker and drinking beer and listening to Led Zeppelin while in Abu Dhabi. At the home of one of my bosses.

There is a Dh50 buy-in--Mrs. Blog covered us both, in the interest of full disclosure--and the games began. Lots of interesting house rules:

-If you run out of chips, others can give you charity but you have to sit with a really creepy "Charity" doll that looks like a cross between the homicidal ghost from "The Ring" and a depressed Dickensian moppet.
-Only one player (who will go unnamed) was allowed to bet in increments of Dh1. Everyone else had to play to the house minimum, Dh2.
-If you leave the table (for a smoke, to take a phone call, etc.), you're playing anyway. One of my favorite moments of the night was when a player took an entire hand off and came back to discover he had won a massive pot.

But the best part was how Mrs. Blog attended poker night for the first time and cleaned everyone out. Yes, including me. I had to sit with the charity doll on more than one occasion. She produced three of a kinds, flushes, straights, pretty much every dominating hand except a straight flush. At one point she even chuckled, Mr. Burns-style, as she raked in her winnings.

Anyway, clearly I have a lot to learn about poker. But at least I'll be covered if I get short stacked.