Bathroom Humor

I did the daily write-ups again this year for the Reno Hilton's World Poker Challenge tournament and came up early for the casino's big New Year's Eve bash. This turned out to be a huge mistake because I ran into a tour group that had been booked into the hotel at the same time.

What's wrong with that? I'll tell you what was wrong! It was a snowboarding tour! Try to get the picture: 3,500 wild snowboarding kids, freed from parental restraints, turned loose on innocent gamblers. Think of those old Tarzan movies where the explorers in the pith helmets were surrounded by thousands of hostile natives, shaking their spears and shields, jumping up and down, and menacingly chanting, "Mugga wugga, wugga mugga." Same thing. Imagine being surrounded by 3,500 menacing snowboarders, all trying to get on the elevators at the same time, shaking their snowboards and shouting, "Hey, dude!" and other meaningless gibberish.

These underaged youths were crammed four to a room, full of raging hormones, unable to dissipate their energy like normal people by playing slot machines. Trouble was inevitable. They partied late, created a noisy ruckus, clashed with the other guests, and fought with security. Complaints poured in. Some guests checked out. Curfew times were imposed, first at midnight, then at 10 p.m. An army of security guards flooded the hallways, trying to maintain some semblance of peace. Finally the kids were thrown out.

The convention group that followed them was the Farm Bureau. What a contrast! The rowdy brats in funky ski wear were replaced by nice old folks from Nebraska, neatly dressed in sport coats and ties over their overalls, smiling and saying things like, "Howdy, ma'am," and "After you, sir," on the elevator. That is, once they figured out what an elevator was, because this was the first time most of them had ever been off their farms. They all went to bed at 8 p.m. and you wouldn't even know they were there if they hadn't been milking their cows in the hallway.

Anyway, let's get on with my story. Do you remember a couple of years back when Phil Hellmuth was heads up with Ken "Skyhawk" Flaton at a Taj tournament? Phil requested an unscheduled bathroom break, and when Skyhawk denied it, Phil knocked down 20 people making a mad dash to the restroom. Just recently, again at the Taj, Men "The Master" Nguyen was heads up against John Juanda. His bladder bursting from 42 Coronas, Men made the same request, and John refused.

Well, here in Reno, in the third WPC event, the same thing happened. The final table was threehanded between Carolyn Gardner (the 1983 World Series of Poker ladies champ), Andy Gamboa, and a player named Gary S. Gary asked if he could go to the bathroom. "Go ahead, honey," Carolyn sweetly replied. "We'll take good care of your chips."

That didn't sit too well with Gary. A while later, as play dragged on and on, his opponents asked if he'd agree to shortening the rounds. "You guys want me to shorten the rounds when you won't let me go to the bathroom?" he exclaimed, half in jest and half in irritation. He seemed determined to keep play going as long as possible … and he did. The result was that this seven-card stud high-low event was the longest tournament in WPC history – maybe the longest in the universe. Eighteen hours! It took 11 hours to get to the final table and then seven more. The threehanded play alone crawled along for more than five hours! I think the eventual winner was Gardner. I'm not sure because I fell asleep. Fortunately, I had my laptop at my side, so I could go to some girly sites instead of being forced to watch the "action." Tournament Director Steve Morrow said he was tempted to raise the limits to $100,000-$200,000. At one point, Linda Johnson, who was doing the announcing for the spectators as she watched the paint dry, yawned, ironically commented, "They're ramming and jamming," then left and went to bed.

After hours of three-way play, Gary, hanging on against big stacks and surviving all in nine times, finally squeezed into second place. This was reminiscent of what happened at the 1993 World Series when Jim Bechtel and John Bonetti had millions of dollars in chips between them, while an amateur player named Glenn Cozen had about $12.50. Instead of waiting, Bonetti decided to go for it with A-K. Bechtel broke him with a set of sixes, and Cozen slipped into second place. The difference was that by moving up a notch, Cozen picked up a few hundred thousand dollars extra. But Gary S. got zip for doing the same. He had earlier agreed to a three-way chop when the players were about even in chips, with only the winner taking an extra $2,000. So, the only thing he accomplished by finishing second was to gain revenge, deprive me and other people of a lot of sleep, and gain our undying enmity. Oh, well, as I sit here bleary-eyed in my hotel room the morning after, at least I'm comforted knowing that I'm getting a column from all this nonsense. After all, 10 bucks is 10 bucks.

And since this column is supposed to be about bathroom humor, let me work in a couple of bathroom jokes. First, allow me to repeat one of my all-time best one-liners from an earlier column. (It's OK, Barry, my readers have a very short attention span and can't remember that far back.) It concerned the time that William Shakespeare, needing a boffo line for one of his plays, was playing in a tournament and badly needed to go to the bathroom, but didn't want to make the long trek to an outhouse and get blinded off. Finally, in agony, he blurted out: "To pee or not to pee?"

The other hilarious one is a wretched and corny play on words that some railbird foisted on me years ago and which until now I've resisted using. "Do you know there's some player who's so famous that his first name is on doors in every casino in the country?" he asked.

I braced myself. "Who's that?" I asked obediently.

"Men the Master."

OK, you try writing a humor column every 14 days for 14 years and see what you can come up with.