Stephen Finger with his children.
Tonight, I’m going to be a “celebrity dealer” (apparently, the organization interprets the word “celebrity” rather loosely) at a Casino Night to benefit the South Carolina chapter of the ALS Association — a group dedicated to fighting what’s more commonly known as Lou Gehrig’s Disease.
The event is from 6 to 10:30 tonight at Social Bar & Lounge in the Vista. Tickets are $25 in advance, but at this point you’ll most likely be paying $35 at the door.
I’ll be dealing blackjack. I’m told this is entirely legal. Even the way I do it.
I’m doing this because I was asked by my son-in-law, whose good friend Stephen Finger, a 36-year-old economics professor at USC, was diagnosed with the disease. Quoting from his blog:
Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis, or Lou Gehrig’s disease, is a progressive neurodegenerative disease that affects the nerves that control your muscles. It is a disease that was first identified in 1869 and was made famous when it killed Lou Gehrig 70 years ago. When you are diagnosed with it today, the treatments and the prognosis are largely the same as the one he received. On average, people live three to five years after the diagnosis, with the disease progressively robbing their ability to control their arms, to walk, talk, swallow and eventually breathe. Every 90 minutes someone new is diagnosed in the US. I was involuntarily volunteered to become an advocate for ALS when I was the one diagnosed in one of those 90 minute periods early this year….
The hope is that I ride this long enough that doctors will make it a fight. There is reason to hope I will see that day. I am younger than the average person diagnosed with this disease. It has started away from my lungs and my throat and could stay that way for years. My legs are still in good shape. Stephen Hawking didn’t go on a ventilator until 35 years after his diagnosis. 10% of people with ALS live at least 10 years after being diagnosed. I am going to a multidisciplinary clinic staffed by specialists whose jobs, whose careers, are centered around keeping me going. Making sure my diet, my speech, my mobility, my ability to communicate, my ability to teach, my ability to chase rugrats around the house, my peace of mind, are all maximized given the state of my progression. Quality of life matters. It contributes to longevity. When you are facing a disease in which the most effective breakthrough to date extends lives a matter of months, these things matter.
I am an extremely rational person. I have some sort of idea of what’s out there. But I know there are many reasons for hope. There is hope that the science will catch up. Right now I ride this disease out knowing that it could take over, and no doctors CURRENTLY could do anything about it. But that won’t always be the case. In 1990 there were 100 research papers published related to ALS. In 2000, there were about 400, and last year there were 1,400. Since the first discovery in 1993, researchers have uncovered more than 25 different genes that may cause the disease. There are increasing numbers of drug trials attempting to beat back the disease. ALS is one of the most promising fields for stem cell research. Two different teams are making huge progress. Phase I safety trials have already been completed, and Phase II trials will begin later this year. These are not hypotheticals. This is real science, with real implementations, with real cells, with real patients, real people, real families, giving real hope to me and my family. Ted Harada gives me hope. My hope is that I will see the day that if I’m willing to let them drill holes in my back and neck and let them inject cells into my spine that I can win. That this disease will switch from a ride to a fight. A fight that I and patients like me, families like mine, can win. I have been utterly impressed by the two ALS doctors I have seen. I know there are smart people working on a cure or a treatment, but I just wish there were more of them. Money helps. For instance, The ALS Association provides grants to post docs or investigators new to ALS working on promising lines of research. Hopefully this gets them addicted. Addicted to the idea of being the one who finds the AZT. The one who finds the chemo, the penicillin. The one who makes the discovery that means when the next guy who goes to the orthopedist, then the neurologist, then the neuromuscular specialist, the doctor will explain to him that he has ALS but as long as he is willing to fight, he can win.
Please come on out and help the cause…
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Bryan says he tried to post something on this, and it didn’t work. Anyone else have trouble?
Anyway, the event went well. I dealt blackjack from 7:30 to 9:30. And you know what? Dealing blackjack is physically demanding, sweaty work — even though you’re just standing there.
I had a full table almost every minute of that time — say, about seven players. Just the physical act of rapidly dealing out all those cards, quickly and repetitively, with the mental strain of keeping track of who’s won and who’s lost and paying out the correct amounts, and trying to do it all quickly so that people don’t get bored and quit… it’s pretty exhausting.
And I made mistakes. I always just gave the players the benefit of the doubt on those. A tricky thing — for me — that seemed simple enough was remembering to deal to myself, and to deal the second card to myself face-down.
Once, I was halfway through the hit-hold stage with the players when I realized I hadn’t dealt the second card to myself. I just scooped up the cards and paid out to every player as though they had won the hand. Another time, I dealt myself the second card face-up — but just said, “Well, now you all know what you’re playing against,” and continued. I think one or two still lost, by trying to beat my cards and busting.
I felt free to do that since it was play money. And yet, despite that, some of the players were fairly intense.
It would have been a very bad night for the house, at my table, had it been real money. Every player started with $20,000 in play money. When I settled up at the end of the night, several players had more than $200,000, and one had more than $320,000.
The last hand — which had no limit — was pretty disastrous for the house. Everybody went all in, and three players had blackjack, which meant a double payout for each. Some won six figures on that hand alone.
I don’t like gambling, even for charity. If people actually dressed up
Iike in a Bond movie, I might!
You broke a sweat dealing cards?
Yep. I was surprised that I found it that strenuous, but I did. Of course, the room was crowded at the time, so they may have raised the temp.
It was very tiring, but I think that was mostly the mental strain of focusing on all those hands I was dealing. Doesn’t sound like much, but I find it hard to focus on an activity like that for any length of time.
I’m a stop-and-think kind of guy. When we were kids, my little brother who was six years younger, could sort baseball cards a lot faster than I could. I was like, “OK, here’s Tim McCarver and he’s with the Cardinals, and I put the Cardinals over… where? Oh, yeah, over here…”
In that amount of time my brother would have sorted five cards.
Speaking of baseball cards — the guy handling the table next to mine actually WAS a “celebrity dealer.” More than I was, anyway. He was Bill Landrum, former Major League relief pitcher. He was in the majors from 1986 to 1993. He played for the Pirates, the Reds, the Cubs and the Expos.
By the way, Wikipedia is confused about him. The text says he was born in Charleston; the graphic at right says Columbia.
And Kathryn, I don’t like gambling, either. I was lucky enough to have a couple of bad experiences with gambling in college which taught me early that betting was not for me.
But it’s interesting the way other people respond to it. They really, really get into it. The fact that the players were so intent on their cards, even though it was play money, put extra pressure on me not to screw up as dealer. The players had to correct me once or twice — for paying off 1-1 instead of 2-1 on a blackjack, and in one case of taking someone’s money when they had won instead of lost. THEY had no trouble keeping track, because they were really into it.
I’d be looking at a player’s face while he was deciding whether to say “hit” or “stay,” and his face would be so serious, I’d want to say, “Come on! It’s play money!”
Yes, it is addictive, in that it stops being fun shortly after you start, in my experience.