Poker and Old West Texas Sayings

BY: Johnny Hughes

I have collected these old poker sayings and Texas folklore sayings for decades. Maybe I'm wrong, but I think these are the major strength of my writing. My new novel, Texas Poker Wisdom, now available,owes them much of its humor.

What always really got me about the oldest gamblers was the perfect topicality or timing. A guy would lose a big pot and come with some old saying, "My tits are sore now. Dunk your head, we are going through a tunnel."

When someone tries table talk, folks answer with old sayings such as, "I can't be stooling off my hand." or snitching off my hand.

If I have the nuts and bet into a player, I watch silently, at first. If he looks as if he is about to fold or he picks up his cards, I start the old sayings, trying to sell a call. "Let me have this one, we'll let you have the next one."

When you sit down next to a stranger, especially a woman, you say, "Let's play along slow until I get something."

When someone raises, you say, "Hey, if I wanted that pot raised, I'd of raised it myself."

When someone plays loose, you say, "He has the raising shits." or "He parked his horse in a red ant bed."

"I could get rich playing your discards."

There were a few I never understood. When someone bet, the old gamblers would say, "I thought he said a match."

"He's so stuck, he'll play ole blocky." Ole Blocky is six-three but nobody that I know knows why.

My absolute life-directing favorite is, "Whichever way your luck is running, it is bound to change."

"I'm up and down like a Yo-Yo. My bankroll looks like an elephant stepped on it. Chicken in the pot one day, feathers the next."

"If I tell you a hen dips snuff, look under her wing and you will find a can."

"He'd steal a hot stove or lay down beside it and claim it."

"He used to be loose as a goose but now he's tighter than Dick's hat band." "Tighter than Broomcorn's Uncle."

"Stick with me, you'll be farting through silk."

"You look good in cheap cloths." or hot cloths.

"He carries a baggie in his pocket where he can steal soup."

"You may win yourselves rich, boys, but you'll never break me."

If someone compliments your hat, watch, etc. come right back, "It's for sale." Ask three times what you paid for it. It works around poker and poker drunk winners.

For excerpts and reviews of Texas Poker Wisdom, www.JohnnyHughes.com

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