Lack of work

This is a problem I didn't think I would encounter during my tour as a dealer at the Series. Lack of work. While there are more poker tables filled with players than anyone has ever seen anywhere, they have hired more than enough dealers to handle it. Case in point was last night. I got to work at six and my first assignment for the $1500 Hold'em tournament that began at noon was to go on break until 6:55 then push into the tournament. When I got there, the players had left for their 90 minute dinner break, so my job was to sit at the table and guard the players' chips. Two tables of guard duty, another break and the players returned. I came back from my break and dealt about five or six hands and my table got broken. This meant that I didn't have a table to deal. Checking with the Dealer Coordinator, there was no other work for me. I was given an "Early out".

Note: Breaking tables - in a tournament, as players bust out throughout the tournament, their seats are filled by breaking a table at the end and sending all of the players from that table to fill the empty seats all around the tournament. That way, the tables melt down to the ultimate single "Final Table" in an orderly fashion. A dealer at a table that is broken is taken out of the rotation and reassigned if there is work available.

What to do? I've only been at work for a few hours and my housemate is in the same situation. We decided to go home, change clothes and go play Poker at the Orleans Casino. We had heard rumors that they have a pretty lively Poker Room over there and figured to give it a shot. We played $1 - $2 No Limit Hold'em at different tables. Interestingly, we both had similar nights, getting down over a hundred and then playing the rest of the night to claw back to even and walk away with a small profit for the evening. Breakfast at Denny's at 2 AM.