Wow. Where do I begin. I can’t believe I’m writing this blog right now. I so should be sleeping.

I played poker for 15 and a half straight hours yesterday. I got home at 3:45 AM. And I’ve got to play day 2 at 11:00 AM today. And I’ve slept literally two hours.

But first let’s talk about my car. And let’s talk about Ray.

See what I did there? Listen, I’m no writer but I live with an excellent one, so I’ve picked up a few things. That right there? That is called foreshadowing. That’s where I give the reader just a hint as to what’s coming, and then while they’re on the edge of their seats I instead proceed to bore them with a bunch of irrelevant shit that I want to talk about. It builds suspense y’see?

So, let’s start at the beginning. I get to Playground poker nice and early, I park my car, and I go inside and register for the tournament. I’ve got a half hour to spare so I go back out to my car and return some phone calls and emails and some work stuff. And while I do this, I’m running the air conditioning. I leave the car and I notice there’s liquid streaming out from under the car. I look under the chassis and there’s a steady drip, drip, drip, coming from somewhere in the middle.

Now, I don’t know if you know this but… I’m Jewish. And you know Jews, I mean, not to paint us all with one brush but we’re not so good with cars and leaky substances and stuff. It says so right in The Torah. Thou shalt not know what a dipstick is. Now by almost any metric, I am not what you would call “a good Jew” but when it comes to mechanical ineptitude, Holy Jesus, I am practically a rabbi.

Anyway, I see the liquid dripping out of my car and I shrug and head into the club. Now I’m playing poker, but I’m still thinking about my car and whether it’ll still go, and how am I going to get home, and where will I leave my dead car. A car-cass, if you will. Oh, that’s a funny one!

So, at some point I announce to the table “does anyone know anything about cars?” Well, Omigod, it’s a table full of guys and one butchy woman. Do they know about cars?! They know everything about cars (not to mention barbeques and hunting moose) Now everyone’s talking about my car. They’re asking questions like “did you smell the liquid” (un, no) “did you rub it into your fingers to see if it was oily or sticky?” (un, no) “did you pop open the hood?” (Uh, what?).

After much debate and interrogation, it was declared that it was just condensation from the air conditioner and that I had nothing to worry about.

But I was still worried, well, because, you know… Jew.

So, we’re playing poker and I’m doing great and on our dinner break this nice guy Ray, a transplanted Quebecer originally from Trinidad, asks me if I’d like it if he takes a look at my car. I said, Ray go eat dinner, but he insists. So, he looks under the hood and uncaps the gas cap and a bunch of other stuff that non-Jews are good at, and he gets underneath the car, and now his pants are dirty, and his face and hands are grimy, and he tells me he sees nothing wrong. And I believe him, and it sets my mind at ease.

I offer to buy him a beer and a bite for his trouble and reluctantly he accepts. Anyway, at the bar Ray tells me that he had to quit poker for a while because his wife had cancer, a very rare and serious form, but luckily she survived and is doing better. Sound familiar? So, Ray and I shared our “wives with tumors” stories over beer and poutine. Is that not hilarious that he ordered poutine?! That’s like a Russian guy ordering beet borscht. That’s like a Swedish guy ordering meatballs. That’s like a black guy… nope not going there.

Anyway, we get back to the tables finally and poor Ray goes out when his QQ couldn’t survive AK. I felt bad. Good guy, Ray. But the important thing is that I didn’t go out. And at 2:50 AM we bagged our chips. I made Day 2! And I made the money! And I’ll tell you more about that in my next blog post. Right now I gotta get in a shower and get in my perfectly operational vehicle and head back to the tables. Wish me luck.