Bean and the Sangria SNG

I picked Bean up at her hotel in Downtown L.A. around 7 last night. After squealing and girl-hugging like we hadn't seen each other in years (8 months but who's counting) I noticed that a horde of young geeky boys waiting in the cab line were staring at us. "Are those your co-workers?" I asked. "They're totally fixated on us." Bean replied, "yeah, that's just because they're not at all used to being outdoors, let along seeing two girls touch each other." We jumped back in the car and took off down 6th Street toward the west side, as the freeways were totally jammed. 6th is also kind of a great route for a quickie L.A. tour. We pass Alvarado Street, where I bought my first fake ID. And then Lafayette Park. You've seen the big fountain in movies. It's also famous for it's vibrant scene of narcotics salespeople. Koreatown is next as we continue west. Used to be sketchy, but now it's rapidly gentrifying. Reasonable rents make it home to countless unemployed writers and non-trust fund kids in the agency mailrooms trying to scrape by on less than 400 a week. And then, Hancock Park. A fancy east-coast town with curving streets and old-fashioned lampposts dropped into the middle of the L.A. grid. And finally, past the behemoths of Park LaBrea and up Crescent Heights into ever-crowded West Hollywood.

Bean is in L.A. for a conference. She works in sales for a small company in Pennsylvania that sells highly technical software to companies like NASA and Boeing. She knows nothing about software. I mean NOTHING. I honestly have no idea how she does her job, and if you ask her, neither does she. Don't get me wrong, Bean is smart. We both went to the same top-ten university. She was an art history major and was never inclined toward anything scientific or computer-related at all. In fact, she's a genius writer and I had always hoped she would pursue that in some way. I'm sketchy on the details of exactly HOW she landed this gig after working in art museums for three years after college, but it had something to do with her computer-geek ex-boyfriend hooking her up with the job when she was seriously in need of one. She's happy there, loves the people she works with and makes decent money. Pretty much the opposite of my job right now.

We met up with Showcase in WeHo and had some fantastic tapas and a pitcher of sangria for dinner. Stuffed mushrooms. Sliced steak on top of blue cheese potatoes. Fantastic bacon-wrapped dates. We caught each other up on gossip about all the snotty fuckwits we used to know in college, one of whom is now a national correspondent for NBC News. Showcase and I had seen him on television in a yellow rain slicker during the hurricane coverage. Bean was so surprised she almost fell out of her chair. "Ohmygod. Peter's on NBC? I kissed him once at a frat party freshman year and he told me he wanted to be a newscaster!"

After dinner, we drove back to our place and smoked a couple of bowls while I outlined for Bean the basic points of No-Limit Hold'em. I explained what beats what, the button and the blinds, how to bet and raise and some basic starting hands. Then we played a few hands heads-up and discovered that Bean has perhaps the worst poker face of anyone I know. She made it an early night since she had to be up early for her computer geek convention. After she left, I smoked some more. Then I had a beer. Then, apparently, I decided to play a SNG. I only know I played a SNG, because this morning I saw the results illegibly scrawled into my poker notebook in glitter pen. I think I came in 6th. I think I went out with kings. I think I called someone an assclown donkeyfucker. And then I passed out.

Sangria + SNG / Sensi Star = -EV