I am now totally convinced that we humans will watch absolutely anything on television, as evidenced by the popularity of the Travel Channel’s “National Poker Tour.” And if you think watching people play golf on television is a major cure for sleeplessness (e.g. watch someone hit a little white dimpled ball (small yawn) watch someone walk after a little white dimpled ball (medium yawn complete with rubbing your eyes), watch someone search for a little white dimpled ball which they hit into a thicket (large Yawn accompanied with stretching out your arms), watch someone finally, after nine hours or rooting around, find a little white dimpled ball which was hit into a thicket (HUGE YAWN with stretching and that yawning noise), watch someone hit a little white dimpled ball again (ZZZZZZZZZZZZZ), then you’ve never been subjected to “Texas Hold ‘Em,” which is the hottest rage in poker currently sweeping the nation clean of insomniacs. (SNORE)
Anyway, the major problem associated with watching television Texas Hold ‘Em is that the only source or movement involved is when you violently throw cold water in your face to keep yourself awake. However, occasionally, a player can actually surprise you by moving one of several small plastic colored chips a grand total distance of about two metric inches. Now since we live in America, and therefore nobody here knows exactly how far two metric inches equals, because we think the metric system is stupid, take it from me, a professional humorist who knows absolutely nothing about the metric system, as evidenced by the fact that I have combined the metric system with inches, two metric inches is a very short boring distance.
Okay, now, if you take a credible sport like, for instance, professional wrestling, you can tell from the expressions found on the faces of the road-raging participants exactly what they are feeling at any point in the steel-death-cage match. So, when one of the wrestlers is hitting the other wrestler over the head with a metal chair, sometimes several thousand times, beating him to within a metric inch of his life, and when the wrestler who was being beaten to within a metric inch of his life miraculously gets up, grabs the chair away from the other wrestler, and then beats that other wrestler to within one metric inch of his life, it is all completely believable thanks to the expressions on their faces.
BUT in Texas Hold ‘Em, the object is to NOT let the other players become aware of their current facial sentiment, lest their foe might figure out that they had a good hand. So the plan here is to always look glum and miserable even if you were dealt four metric aces. And, therefore, all expert poker players carry around dismal appearances, so much so that if you were to accidentally click on a Texas Hold ‘Em tournament, you would swear you tuned into “The Diaper Rash Support Group Channel.”
So, basically - and I mean the following in a nice way - if you are one of those people who routinely watches television golf and/or television poker, or both, then you need to get a life. ONLY KIDDING! If you are habitually watching these types of shows you are probably already dead. ONLY JOKING!
Look, relax, but seriously, if you watch these kinds of shows, then you’ve doubtless asked yourself why they have television commentators for golf and poker, who, in hushed, melodramatic tones, deliver vitally important golfing and Texas Hold ‘Em information. And the reason for commentators is simple: to keep you AWAKE even though you might already be currently DEAD!
EXAMPLE OF A GOLF COMMENTATOR COMMENTING
“Oh, no, he just hit his ball into the pond, Mike. And now I think he’s about to enter the pond to locate his golf ball, Mike, because if he does not find his golf ball, Mike, he will lose a stroke, Mike. And now I believe he is being eaten alive by an alligator, Mike, and I know this because after years of golf commentating, Mike, I can tell when a golfer is being eaten alive by the high-pitched screaming and by the fact that there is usually an alligator firmly attached to their head, Mike.”
EXAMPLE OF A Texas Hold ‘Em COMMENTATOR COMMENTING
“He’s peeking at his cards, Steve. He has a Jack and a Queen, Steve. I think he’s going to bet, Steve. No, wait, he’s choking on a plastic chip, Steve. Wake up, Steve, and dial 911, Steve.”
But poker is poker, and all the poker-like games are played in essentially the same way: someone deals you cards, which you sneakily look at while pretending to NOT be looking at, after which you place a bet, and then you sit back and watch all the other players pretend to pretend that they are pretending to NOT look at their cards, followed by them placing a bet, at which point you pass out from complete and utter boredom, and then the player next to you, who has had industrial-strength toothpicks surgically installed in his eyelids to keep them open, scoops up your chips and heads for the slot machines where he engages in a violent barroom brawl with an elderly blue-haired lady, who has a mean left pocketbook, and who is NOT giving up her slot machine to anyone, because she has staked claim to the exact same slot machine since before the invention of Indian reservations.
