Posted on 03/12/2017 8:01:22 PM PDT by Swordmaker
My girlfriend, ex-wife, and younger daughter and I were playing cards this afternoon. We were playing double-deck contract pinochle. My daughter shuffled and my ex-wife cut the cards and dealt the first hand. My girlfriend bid and won the contract for the first hand. This is that hand she got, a once in a lifetime pinochle hand:
Meld scoring in this game was handed down from both sets of double grandparents on my side and my ex-wife's side from the two different parts of the mid-west. It does not comport with the Las Vegas meld rules but I have seen it in Hoyle's Rules for Pinochle. The melding score conventions seem to be all over the place for Pinochle and are apparently regional and can be hard to pin down any agreement. For example some written rules claim that Triple Pinochle is only 60 points while others say 90 while the 60 point crowd claim that quadruple is 90, and the 90 point crowd hold out for 300 points for a quadruple Pinochle. Similarly, the rarity of being dealt a triple run in any suit argues for a ten fold increase over a double run, not just for a minor bump in points that some award it. Those who award the triple run a minor bump, award a quadruple runs double the score of a double run, which flies in the face of all rules of probability.
A game in Double-Deck Contract Pinochle is 500 points, with the contracting side winning if both go over. This hand which consists of triple aces around at 1000 points, a run in the Trump suit of diamonds for 15 points, and a Double Pinochle (Queen of Spades, Jack of Diamonds) for 30 points, all totaling 1045 points! The extra trump Queen means nothing except it can be used to trump someone else's Ace when the declarer is out of a suit! First hand of the day, game over, all she wrote. One hand, just the meld was 545 points more than enough to win the game!
In my over 60 years of playing Pinochle I have seen only a couple of hands similar to this although not for as many points. . . that was the last (and best) hand my ex-wife's mother was dealt in her life when at age 95 ½ she was dealt a hand that consisted of a double-run for 150 points, double aces around for 100 points, and a triple pinochle for 90 more points, totaling 340 points! Four days later she died peacefully having never played another hand of cards!
We've had a running joke in our family in the years since then that no one wants to get that good a hand. . . they may not survive the experience!
In my lifetime of Pinochle playing, I have had Triple Kings around. . . that's 800 points. My daughter once had a got a Triple run in hearts. . . I wasn't there for that one. . . but that scores 1500 points in a game of 500.
This hand is almost the equivalent of being dealt a Royal Flush cold. . .
Playing cards with your girlfriend and ex-wife at the same time? Sounds a bit too civilized.
First time I ever played my ex-GF poker, she dealt me 4 kings. We didn’t play much poker after that, but she beat the cr@p out of me at spite and malice.
played double deck but never “contract” double deck.
I dated her right after you then! :)
Grandpa John would give you 750 melt for that hand
See what I mean? Meld points seem to be a matter of regional opinion when it comes to Pinochle and nobody is going to agree. Still a game winning hand, though.
I’m more amazed that you’re playing cards with a girlfriend AND an ex-wife!
Grandpa John was from the Polish region
Don’t know pinochle, but how do you get 3 identical aces with only two decks in a double-deck game?
She must have taught my ex to play that game.
Pinochle deck has 48 cards...9 through Ace for two sets of each suit. Now double that for double deck of 96 cards.
Pinochle starts out as a weird game. Single deck pinochle is played with a deck of 48 cards consisting of two sets every card from the nine through the Ace in all four suits. Thus there would be two nines of spades, two tens of spades, two jacks of spades, two queens, two kings, and two Aces. Repeat for hearts, diamonds and clubs. Now, it gets gets a bit weirder. The order of priority of the cards from highest to lowest is Ace, Ten, King, Queen, Jack, Nine.
When you play double-deck Pinochle, you toss out the nines. That way when you deal them you will be able to handle the resulting cards in your hand without too many cards. When four people play, each player gets 20 card's dealt to them. If the nines were still in the deck, 24 would be more to handle and it get's awkward. The nines slow down the play, so most people toss them. Double-deck is played with 80 cards, instead of 96, with four Aces, Tens, Kings, Queens, Jacks in each suit.
in double-deck Pinochle, it's customary to banish the plebeian nines and play with only 80 cards. Simplifies things and speeds up the play.
We usta keep the dices.
Musta been Brooklyn rules...LOL
Another rule we had was that signals (cheating) ABOVE the table were OK...,.if you could get away with them.
Below the table was another matter entirely.
Great fun.
Played cutthroat with a friend who might have had a hand like that when he came back from the rest room... he picked up his cards and incredulously said we must have set up the cards... my other friend and I, simultaneously threw in the hand saying there was no fooling him, that he was on to us... we never found out what he had... but we were sure we didn’t want to play it...
Played cutthroat with a friend who might have had a hand like that when he came back from the rest room... he picked up his cards and incredulously said we must have set up the cards... my other friend and I, simultaneously threw in the hand saying there was no fooling him, that he was on to us... we never found out what he had... but we were sure we didn’t want to play it...
I was playing in a poker room last week and got only my fifth Royal Flush ever. Two hands later I got quads. Unfortunately it was in a tournament so I didn’t get the $650 jackpot for the royal I would have in a cash game.
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