Gus is the fella on the left, and a knife-buying ol’ customer of  his, also named A. J., is on the right.  On a whim, waiting for Irene to get back from the Roswell Tourist Information Bureau, I wandered into their store, directly across the sleepy street from the Alien Museum in Roswell, NM.  A. J. seemed to be an exceptionally nice guy but Gus is a trip. He reminds me a bit of a more pirate-ish version of myself. While he was overcharging me for a few nice collectable poker chips we swapped some stories…he’s played in the big cash games (Texas Holdem) with Doyle and Todd Brunson, took lessons at $2,500 a half-hour from Doyle, knows people who own casinos, buys and sells collectables all over the U.S. and is thinking now of buying an RV, traveling around the U.S., picking and selling collectables to and for his hundreds of clients, and playing poker. I like this guy, no pun intended, and I suspect he and I will do some business down the road as I have a lot of duplicate poker chips and more duplicate out of print poker books.

Gus and another A. J., Roswell, NM