Gary the Card Player and Gambler

(l-r) Ricky, Gary, Patto, Boris, Nathan, Colin

Gary loved the occasional game of cards and the regular bet on sporting trivia or an upcoming event. He didn't often finish on the wrong side of a bet.

In his late teens he told me he got into the ponies for a while but it stung him pretty bad, so he learned from his mistakes and rarely donated to the TAB after that.

At cards, be it Texas Holdem or Manila, Gaz was always a handful for an opponent. We enjoyed many late nights playing poker with Gaz getting a good laugh out of my miscalculations and bad bluffs.

Gaz once visited Ricky Coleman and I on the Gold Coast with his big mate Dom. He extricated about $300 from a somewhat naive Ricky playing Manila for his first time. Several beers later they were sitting outside and watching a cat sitting on the grass beside a road. A bet was struck whereby Gaz would win $100 if the cat walked onto the path before it walked onto the road. After several impatient minutes Gaz launched a missile in the direction of the cat, trying to scare it toward the path. The cat however jumped in the opposite direction onto the road, resulting in a win to Rick and a story that entertained us on many occasions.