NOT JUST POKER

“…its name was called Babel, because there the lord confused the language of all the earth….” (Genesis 11:1-9)  The confusion of tongues is usually thought to have occurred during the days of Peleg (Gen. 10:25).   Not so!

Every time a group of people, maybe even friends or relatives or business associates, get together and decide to play Poker, having never before played poker as that particular group, chaos occurs. Now, this chaos never occurs when people for the first time sit to play Hearts.  It’s just a matter of passing cards one way, then the other, across, then not.  Not too many variables in Hearts. In Bridge, of course there are Duplicate and Contract, maybe even Chicago. When two sit to play Bridge, no doubt but it is going to be Honeymoon they play. With Rummy, there are variations like Gin, and Knock…even Michigan (aka, Boodle), if you have the board.  Usually, when someone says Rummy, he or she means Knock  Rummy.  When someone wants to play Gin Rummy, he or she just says, “Let’s play Gin.”

When it comes to playing Poker, unless someone says let’s play Hold ‘Em or Omaha [or god forbid, Stud (and then what kind?)], agreeing on terms and conditions gets harried.  As an example, with Omaha one could mean Omaha High-Only or Hi-Lo, the latter almost always is accepted as eight low or better–“cards-speak ” or “lay-down,” as played in casinos. As unusual as it may be,  one  player, in one home game in which I played, used to deal Omaha Hi-Lo with a declaration after river card betting was complete. 

If we stop here, we can start to see how “Babelrific” all this can become.  In some games, there is betting after the declaration; in others, there is not.   (In years gone by there was actual verbal declaration and one could possibly win one way or the other by default. As example, if there were four players remaining and the first three all declared high, the fourth could claim half the pot by just declaring low. Games with verbal in-turn declarations are rather rare these days, because position-value of declaring last is so great it makes the game unfair.) In games of declaration there is much *confusion over how many chips indicate(s) low; how many, high; how many, both ways (in some games refered to as “going pig” or “swinging” ).

Most commonly, simultaneous declarations are  done by remaining players placing chips or coins or tokens in their hands and forming a closed fist. Each player remaining in the game takes *two chips or coins or tokens below the table, then brings up a closed hand  containing zero, one, or two (*or in some instances more). After all players have brought their closed hands above the table, they all reveal their holdings. Zero may indicate the player low, one high, and two chips swing.

*To digress………………..Perhaps, you will  join me.   Contact your Congressman or Congresswoman now!  It is time to “standardize declaration in Poker games.”  The nation requires uniformity in declaring at poker games. Zero for low, one for high, two for both ways should be the standard.  I am sure that if we can get this legislation through, we can then get this before the United Nations and get this standardized internationally.

More Babel coming in 1:2-2 (maybe more)