Mindless at Hollywood Park

[Zeno]

Hollywood Park exists. Saying anything more could be misconstrued as some obtuse compliment that this place simply does not deserve. At Hollywood Park the atmosphere is poisonous, the clientele rotten, the staff a pack of goons, the service laughable, and the players inane, with the vastness of the parking lot adding to the general forlorn and forbidding nature of this baroque structure to human idiocy. In other words, I enjoyed the place.

I signed up for the 10/20 and 15/30 games and soon got in the 20 game. As soon as I sat down, and in the very first hand I witnessed, a volcanic eruption occurred over the betting and calling sequence on the turn and river, mainly due to dealer ineptness, player inattentiveness, and the general visceral hatred displayed by all concerned. The floor was called over but this just resulted in even more extensive bickering and in nothing substantial being done except that ‘the camera’ should be looked at etc. It was not resolved until about twenty minutes later. Welcome to California Poker, I thought.

I soon moved to the 30 game. A little less hatred was displayed at this table but more idiocy, if that seems possible, and I assure you it is. I witnessed odd folds, emotional outbursts, boneheaded crying calls, continual juvenile whining, shaking of the noggin in disbelieve and consternation, dealer abuse, and overall brain abuse and mind misuse. The local miscreants were at their best and displayed an ever mounting and seething foolishness that held an almost gaudy and irresistible charm. I was down a little but made a short quick run and ended up in the black a few hundred. My luck changed just as Michael Davis showed up. We caused a ruckus by talking and Michael hanging about behind me for only a few seconds, but enough for the ‘gentlemen’ on my left to post some objections and other irrational loathing towards Mike and I, he was losing and very keyed up. Also, the ‘gentlemen’ to my right shot a parting insult at me as I folded my last hand and left. I simply agreed with his comment. Anyway, I racked up and left after playing for a few hours, if that.

We went to the bar and since I was fighting a cold, I drank tomato juice. I had a very fine and interesting discussion with Michael, which was occasionally made difficult when yelling and whooping erupted over the chariot races beaming from all the TVs. We talked some about poker and other topics. I was certainly glad to meet this bright young man. He was kind enough to give me a lift back to the hotel. By the way, the Marriott by LAX is a 70's style concrete monument to ugliness - A listless building of boring functionality. What exacerbates the vileness of the place is the color - a sticking urine stain, or dull puss yellow, that revolts the eye and arrests the mind. A flaming lime green would have been better; at least it would give the building a blinding gaudiness that would have the redeeming feature of being worth seeing. This hotel is a great big nothing. Sort of like LA. [img]/images/graemlins/smirk.gif[/img]

-Zeno