Playing: Big Blind Benny, Flopper Felts, JC Cornelia, Paul "Cojones" Carvill, Jamie "Chipsack" Milbourn

Venue: Streatham Spastic Society Community Centre, Liquidation and Closing-Down Sale

"We had joy, we had fun, we could smell Nick Carney's bum."

"Goodbye to you my trusted friend"

I drove up here tonight in my Punto, with Jamie in the passenger seat, my plastic poker chips in the footwell, Jamie's flashy poker chips in their felt-lined aluminium case resting on his lap, and two crates of beer sitting in the back. I was doing a thing where I was trying to avoid traffic near Clapham, but my car is a traffic-magnet and so we got stuck for a while on a road near Wimbledon looking at a shop that sold 35 different types of rum. The route is basically one long road, and I gave Jamie some printed directions, and he still managed to get us lost. Not lost, really, as we hadn't turned off anywhere, but he plainly had no idea where we were and it was only through my perseverance, enthusiasm and stamina that we emerged in once piece at the top of Streatham High Road. Jamie exhibits a childlike sense of awe whenever he leaves the leafy confines of Hersham. I have a head full of cold and I can't work out whether to have the window open and the heater on or the window closed and the heater off, so I settle for a constant and annoying winding up and down of the window and flicking on and off of the heater. When we arrive and disembark it looks like we are preparing for a day at the beach. We are carrying beers, bags, cases, fold-up chairs, cd's and food. We mull over the possibility that House Manager Mr P. Feltham has layed on a finger buffet for his guests tonight. Not a chance. The fashion is currently one metric tonne of assorted crisps, to be eaten as quickly as possible before JC Cornelia turns up and fills his pockets full of them. I don't think Jim is allowed crisps at home.

"We've known each other since we were nine or ten"

No show tonight from The Welsh Wizard who us busy re-editing the history books so he appears, Zelig-like, in every episode of Baywatch as Hasselhoff's small gay apprentice lifeguard manager. Also not appearing is Kentucky Fried Keggers, who's decided to stay in and pen his contentious essay "Texas Hold 'em: Blinds - Wha' The Fuh'?". We do have Jamie, who's put the day-to-day business of managing Sony's accounts aside, and come direct from a memorial service for his godfather, god bless him. Also showing is Big Blind Benny, who spends his days touching-up ladies legs. Photographs of ladies legs. That lovely shot of Kylie's bum in the gentlemen's magazine you flick through at the dentists probably has Benny's hands all over it. Benny's on a stinking great losing streak, and everyone knows it. Flopper Felts puts money in the bank by selling snow to eskimos, along with a direct cross-media communication strategy to announce to retail partners and vertical markets the availability and cheapness of said snow should you come to us your number one snow dealer in eskimo country! Like Samson, he believes his power lies in his fiery hair. Then there's something about lions and bees and honey, but the metaphor breaks down, so...... No Jimbo yet, he's a mysterious man who moves in mysterious ways and he's on a crosstown journey, underground and incommunicado like Mr X. Jim is public enemy number one and practically "persona non grata" at the game. I'm convinced he stays up half the night studying all the great poker textbooks and refining his technique, then spends the other half perfecting his ridiculous Chaplin-esque persona. He's really a poker-playing machine wrapped up in the body of a Chuckle Brother.

"Together we´ve climbed hills and trees"

Tonight is more poignant than usual. It's the last major poker event to be held at the Streatham Spastics Society Community Centre. The manager Mr P. Feltham has decided that the accomodation and caring costs of live-in registered-disabled mascot Nicky Carney were too much to shoulder, and the enterprise is being sold to the Saudis for a tidy sum. Enough to keep them both in pornos and Pampers for a longtime to come. So it is with a tear in our collective eye that we chink-chink our bottles of beer and hunkerdown for Game 1.

"Learned of love and ABC´s"

-Boom! Game one, hand one goes to Felts, a sure sign that tonight he will either win, lose or break even.
-Felts takes the second hand too, with pocket Q's trumping Ben's pocket 2's - always risky.
-I win a hand with my patented "big quid" bets pre-flop and flop. Nervous folds all-round.
-Me again, just me and Felts on the flop but he loses his bottle.
-Felt's takes the next one, scaring Jamie off on the turn with a £2 bet.
-First BIG hand, me and Benno in a showdown. He's called me all the way through to the river, and darn it if Kegger's bluffing accusation is ringing in my ears as I flip a pathetic Ace high against his two pair. Nice £16 quid pot.
-I steal the pot from Jamie when he pulls up in front of my £4 bet.
-Ben and Jamie are stack chips up against each other until theshowdown brings the inevitable shared pot from their two pair A's and 10's.
-There's a lesson to learn in this next hand. I'm holding 7 and 8 of clubs. Flop brings 10 clubs, J clubs, K diamonds. I put in a £4 bet and everyone folds. A wasted opportunity. We turn the turn (a contentious issue which a later vote will put a stop to) and it's the A clubs! The nut flush! Judging what people will and won't put into a pot is a fine art and one that need's attention. For a couple of fine examples keep reading, whereupon you will discover some outrageous manoevres by that lying cheating bastard Feltham.

"Skinned our hearts and skinned our knees"

The board reads A J 6 7 and Felts places a £1.80 bet which secures the pot.
Benny wins with Q Q 6 6 versus my miserable Ace high. Again. I was chasing a straight draw like a salivating punch-drunk idiot and Benny's two pair was the one-two punch that knocks me to the canvas, unsure whether to stick my head up again for another pummelling. Felts reaches over to a side-table and peels back a sheet of kitchen-roll to reveal a scooby-snack-sized stack of ham sandwiches, expertly made with his own massage-parlour-trained-and-manicured hands, the dainty hands of a lady. In fact when he's holding 2 aces you'd be forgivne for betting into him because you're admiring his nailpolish handiwork. The mustard is strong enough to blow your head off, and the boys are happy. Feltham came through for us, we say, my hunger is sated and I'm ready to play cards some more!
Benny bags pocket rockets but they're not good enough to beat Jamie's craftily hidden 2 pair!! Can't fault the man for trying, but Big Blind Benny's been stung before when he's on the make.

"I'm really naive, but what are pocket rockets?" says Jamie.

"A losing hand" replies everyone in imperfect unison.

Board reads 4 K 8. Jamie, on the wrong side of a short stack, goes all-in!! Ben calls!! Showdown!!! Jamie has 9 K, Ben's got A K!! Turn comes a Q, helping no-one. River is a 6 and Benny has wiped Jamie out with a pair of K's with Ace kicker!!!

At that moment the wind whistled through the hallway, a shadow crossedthe threshhold, and the creamy marshmallow that is JC Cornelia's hair came into view.
"Howdy boys!"
he says, and our heads spin and our stomachs turn to mulch.

"Goodbye my friend it´s hard to die"

Still to come...

Game 2, wherein I lose my shirt, and James Cornelia gets a new coat.............