I'm beginning to think that I hate poker.....

I spent Friday night playing $4-8 at the Palms. I won a total of 2 pots in nearly 4 hours. The curse continues. For sometime now I have been disgusted with low limit poker. I can't stand getting drawn out on. Losing to a better hand I can deal with. Losing to 3-8 off-suit that called a pre-flop raise gets old. Sure, that is how I want them to play and in the long run I wouldn't want to be that player, but it sure is frustrating.
Saturday night brought a respite and poker was replaced by Pan; the obligatory caricatures of poker players were replaced by friends and the comfort that goes along with them. I actually won a few pennies.
Sunday afternoon brought poker raging back into my life. I stopped at Harrah*s fully intending to play in their little NL game. The room at Harrah*s was roaring with activity. All 10 tables were full. I have NEVER seen that level of activity there. As it turns out, they were hosting a poker tournament for thier high limit pit players. Consequently, there were a ton of monied players with limited knowledge of the game of poker. Nirvana, right? I sat in a $10-20 limit game licking my chops. **SMACK** back to reality you silly boy. The $10-$20 game played like a $2-4 game full of drunk college kids on spring break. Again, the pathetic hands got there and I was sent packing with a much lighter wallet. Is there a limit where people play SANE poker? I doubt it. Enough of my whining about playing.....now some gripes (observations)about dealing the damn game.
Before I entered my first game tonight, I visited with a regular player who was taking a break. He was way up in a $2-5 NLH game and asked if I was to be his next dealer. I confirmed that I would be dealing to him next and he made this declaration: Push me any pot over $300 and you get $50. You know how this story played out. I didn't push him ANY pots, let alone a $300+ pot. Story of my life.....lol
Later I'm waiting to push into another $2-5 NLH game. I notice that there is a rack and a stack (about $600) in red sitting on a side table beside a player. Before I get into the box I ask said player if those were his chips. He said yes, they were. I asked him to place them on the POKER table, not the side table. He said no, and that I could figure it out for myself. It turns out that he had hit one of our high hand jackpots for $599. In our room, you can take jackpot money off of the table...IF you do it immediately. I suggested that he should exchange the chips for cash since cash does not play in our $2-5 NL game. Negatory, good buddy. He left them sit right where they were. I told him that I had my eye on them and that they were NOT to come into play. He said he KNEW that and that he had kept them out of play. Immediately, two or three players spoke up and said that he HAD been alternating between them being in-play and out-of-play. Why the hell had these players witnessed this and not said anything while it was going on? Who the hell knows. Of course he would bring them into play when he had the best of it. How many dealers had seen the rack sitting there and not questioned it? The moral of the story is: What did I get for trying to protect the game? You guessed it........STIFFED by said player.

Where is my birth certificate? I hope that I can find it because in one week I will be on a plane headed for the poker cruise via NYC. I'm going to need that BC. Maybe I'll start looking for it tomorrow. After all, tomorrow is another day.................