Day 2 Monday July 26, 2004

Hotel:
Checked into the Rio today. I wasn’t planning on staying at the Rio this trip but a last minute mail offer that offered 2 free nights and a pair of Maui Jim sunglasses got me to book. While I don’t need the room the glasses have a $150 retail value (why do people spend that for sunglasses?) and they seem to sell well on eBay so I figured I’d take them up on the offer. I had the option of just checking in and leaving the room empty but with the crappy room at Sahara and a lack of anything to play there I decided I’d stay here.

Check in was a breeze at the platinum line and I was on my way to room 856 in just a few minutes. I always request a room away from the elevators, a room with a view on a high floor, and non-smoking. Usually they only get part of it right. Today it was the away from the elevator part. I was all of the way at the end of the hallway. This was is actually a corner room in the Ipanema Tower. It is pretty much the same as all of the other rooms at the Rio except it has floor to ceiling windows on 2 wall instead of just one. The bathroom is slightly smaller than the other rooms here too because the emergency exit steps are taking up some of the space. This room is way nicer than the room at Sahara!

After getting to the room I went to the slot club booth to get my sunglasses and they boothling there said they were out but they should be in tomorrow. She said that if they weren’t in they would ship them to me when they arrived. This pissed me off a little because they had to know how many glasses they needed based on the number of reservations they had.

Dining:
For lunch I did something a little different than normal. Instead of getting a comped meal at a casino I went to Jack in the Box. I haven’t had food from here since they left the New York area 25 years ago. It was good and I ordered off the value menu and had a $3 lunch. I probably won’t eat this stuff for another 25 years now!

After my mega session of video poker I walked over to the Gold Coast. They are still running a ½ point special in their restaurants when you pay with points. I went to the Monterey room and got a bowl of Wor Won Ton Noodle Soup. It’s noodles, won tons, chicken, pork, shrimp, and vegetables in a chicken broth. It’s pretty good but very over priced at $11 per bowl.

Gaming:
I started off at the Rio playing my normal 8/5 bonus progressives. This machine started out ok giving me good play but then died. I dropped $200 in less than an hour and went almost 1400 hands before hitting my first quad. I finally hit quad 4’s. Then in the next 40 hands I hit quad 3’s and 4’s again. From here they quads finally balanced out. I now only down less than $100 instead of the nearly $300 I was down before the 3 bonus quads hit. I eventually hit quad aces and was ahead by $6. Being a gambler I decided that I’d risk the $6 and continue playing. I hit a few more quads to keep going and then hit quad aces again. After over 4 hours and 5k coin in I cashed out with a $51 win. That’s not huge win considering most of my quads were bonus quads and I hit aces twice but considering that I went so long with no quads and I was almost down $300 I’ll consider it a gift that I actually walked away from this session a winner.

After dinner at the Gold Coast I played some double deck blackjack. The table was good and I get ahead. I was playing 2 hands and I went about 6 or 7 rounds before I even busted a hand. I was up over $100 when the dealer got hot and after losing a few double downs I quit with a $50 win and headed back to the room to call it a day.

Total win/loss for the day $100
Total comps for the day $182