Pissed-up cardshark WIN
This is one of my favourite anecdotes about my dad.

My father is a big drinker and very sociable. He loves pubs, and on arriving in a new town will immediately seek out an inn and spend eye-watering amounts of money on 'getting to know the locals.'
The price of my dad's beery generosity is allowing him to hold court with his theatrics and grizzled wisdom. The barman hands him a pint and he's off on a typically bellicose and entertaining display of posturing, 70s politics, military anecdotes and magic tricks, usually with a suitably attentive audience. After all, he's buying the drinks.
One particular evening in a bar in Scarborough, a deck of cards had appeared. I'll give my dad his dues, he knows some amazing card tricks. He spent the evening wowing staff and clientele alike with an array of spectaculars that would make Paul Daniels break his own fingers in envy. The drunker he got, the more bold and inventive the tricks became. However, one fractious young man was getting more and more infuriated by my dad's trademark blend of attention-seeking and infallible sleight-of-hand.

After one particularly outstanding trick … in fact, let me sidetrack for a second to explain it, because it's a fucking cracker. He pretends to be Wyatt Earp (twat!) and deals out poker hands to himself and four 'baddies' (i.e. random drinkers). Invariably he gets caught dealing to himself from the bottom of the deck, so gets called out. Admitting his deception, he gets a new pack of cards, and allows someone else to shuffle it and continue the deal. Everyone checks their hands – two have flushes and two have full houses. They play their hands expecting certain victory, then my dad turns over his – four aces. It's fucking great …

Anyway, he'd done this trick, and for the irritable young man this miraculous display was the final straw. He leapt up, strode across to my dad, pulled the deck from his hands and snatched a random card out of it. Holding it up in the air, he shouted:
"RIGHT YOU CLEVER FUCKING BASTARD, WHAT FUCKING CARD IS THIS?"

"Ten of clubs."

There was a mirror behind him.
( Wet-chinned bag shanker Cannot parse Wogan, Fri 25 Feb 2011, 12:27, 8 replies)

That is outstanding
Have a click
(Reverend Fister "a disciplined fuckwit", Fri 25 Feb 2011, 12:36, closed)

And another
*click*
( ogwen69 has returned from Reddit, Fri 25 Feb 2011, 12:57, closed)

Your dad is full of win.
*click*
( .Yeti. El amor en los tiempos del cólera, Fri 25 Feb 2011, 13:22, closed)

can i just point out
that a running flush (assume you mean straight flush) beats 4 aces so your dad might be good at card tricks but he knows nothing about poker! :-)
(mrbridger2010, Fri 25 Feb 2011, 13:43, closed)

Pretty sure my dad knows his poker
and the error is mine. I certainly don't know my poker.

He definitely finishes with four aces, so presumably two of the hands are just straights or flushes.

I will edit accordingly. :)
( Wet-chinned bag shanker Cannot parse Wogan, Fri 25 Feb 2011, 13:50, closed)

I really enjoyed that
and wish there were more blokes like that in the pubs I worked at... would have made the shifts fly by!
(ElectricSexPants would like to be the Sultan of something, Fri 25 Feb 2011, 14:18, closed)

Thought you were...
...going in a different direction - that punchline is aces!
(sarcastic fringehead feet of clay, buns of steel, head of lettuce, Fri 25 Feb 2011, 17:47, closed)

bomp ta-dsssh!
unlurked from deep down below only to spread the likeys
(funktrash soul = combustion engine, Sat 26 Feb 2011, 15:52, closed)

Your Dad...
... should be everyone's dad, or uncle, or granddad or family friend or ... something. There are just not enough people like this to go around.

In fairness, it sounds like he tries.

*click*
( Ugi , it's a game of give and cake, Tue 1 Mar 2011, 16:29, closed)