To Chat During Internet Poker or Not to Chat. That is the Question

Two consecutive nights with an upgrade. And the play is no longer rocket speed. That's weird.

Chatting during Internet Poker was at it's heighth eight years ago. Social networking wasn't big and "people" would actually post all kinds of stupid stuff. I can still recall all those 10-20 fixed limit Omaha Hi-Lo tables I cut my teeth on and learning way more than I wanted to know about JennieSue from Kansas's baby and AKMoose's back problems. "People" typed in full sentences until the Internet Poker Texting Law (IPTL)was put into effect.

For a bit after this chat was reduced to some awfully mundane "nh"s and "ty"s. In general "people" did not address other "people" by their screen names. Because of the harsh sentences imposed by the IPTL we're at where we are today. Not even a simple "nh" can be uttered during an entire one hour plus sit and go.

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Shut up or everyone will know what a dufus you are. You're assets will be frozen and you will be banned from the site. (As amended by article 4 in the addendum regarding relinquishing Ben and Jerry's ice cream rights during your prison term.)

And heaven forbid if you keep chatting in Spanish. Then the English Only Nazis come out and remind you that PokerStars is an English only site. Surely repeat offenders have had their eyelids forced open and required to watch Battlefield Earth for 12 hours straight.

On this three table sitter I was moved from one table to another. Here I am visiting two different tables with no chat at all for more than an hour until someone finally breaks the ice with an IPTL illegal "nice hand." 10 more minutes go by and finally some poker texts start to populate the chat. Then, after one "nh" that was not responded to was not met with the proper "ty" the table goes ballistic on how some people just don't chat. And after that this insane conversation about hometown merits drones on.

There's no need for me to get involved. In fact, my paranoid side wonders if this is for my benefit. Let's prove to this non-chatting idiot (me) that we're real people. I don't buy it. I have had more meaningful conversations with dishtowels than goes on here. And a warning from personal experience. Do NOT get a dishtowel drunk. They'll just go on and on and on all night about how their mother-in-law hates them, how much they hate their job because of all the water, how they can't get the attention of the cute Brillo pad and blah blah blah etc.... And then you end up holding them by the little hook hanger thingie as they puke in your toilet so they don't drown. Not the ideal evening.

If you feel the need to chat so much please log in to The Big Lay Down's newly created site.

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This will surely be a big hit.

And although it isn't free it only costs 2,000 free money chips.