I was sitting among strangers in this big brownstone house, playing two hands—perfect Basic Strategy—and trying to go plus-one, minus-one in my head the way I’d been taught. There’s nothing too unusual about that, I guess. Millions of people take blackjack tests every day, or some kind of test. But I was less talented, at [...]

One morning I got on an airplane. It was the trip that I’d been waiting for forever. I brought cards on the flight and I brought a copy of Ray Kroc’s autobiography. Plus the Wall Street Journal and some gum.
I was going to meet people of whom I knew little, to join an escapade [...]