Poker and the Tooth Fairy

Several years ago, I had all my old blog posts backed up into some format or another. I don't have any idea how this format works but I do know a workaround so that I can actually see those old posts. And at the same time, now many of those posts are gone from the Internet. This is no great loss for the world. But ... I kind of want them up somewhere.

So I'm going to periodically begin posting some old posts and snippets of old posts, just for fun and just so they are up on the site.

This is from November 20, 2007 ... when I was playing computer poker with a then six-year-old Elizabeth. Wow, I wasn't a great parent:

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I have this Texas Hold ‘Em poker game on my computer, and it’s actually somewhat competitive and addictive. But the strange part is that you play against fictional and historical characters. So, for instance, I might start a game up right now (why not?) and I would play against Little Red Riding Hood, Dracula, The Abominable Snowman and Julius Caesar. Nothing wrong with that.

Well, my oldest daughter, Elizabeth, LOVES this game. I mean, it’s scary how much she loves it. She’s 6 now, and she just loves looking at the characters, giving me little facts about them, you know, how Cleopatra was in Egypt and had lots of jewels (she learned this from Scooby Doo) and how Abraham Lincoln was born in a log cabin and how Robin Hood stole from the rich and so on.

So, you know, I started thinking that, in a weird way, this game was kind of good for her. You know. Educational. Learning about Abe Lincoln. Napoleon. I’m trying to give her all sorts of facts while we’re playing — this is hard because I don’t actually have many facts about these people. Still, so far, I have more than she does. I’m starting to think that this is not just fun time, this is what we call in our house “Learning time.”

Then today, my daughter — 6 years old — says to me: “Wow, Dad, King-Seven, not-the-same-suit, I would fold. I think the Tooth Fairy has an Ace.”