Day 2 Thursday August 8, 2002

Today I popped up wide-awake at 5:40am. I guess I’m still on Eastern Time! Instead of lying around for a few hours I decided to get up and get motivated. I started my day off by going to the Palms to play the FPDW progressive. There was no one playing when I got here and the jackpot was $1033. I played for a little over an hour. I was getting a little aggravated here because I was hitting natural quads one after another but, that’s one of the things that makes deuces wild a little streaky! I was lucky enough to 4 natural 7’s and cashed in the Las Vegas Advisor coupon for a 100 coin bonus. I left here even after playing about 1k through the machine.

I went back to Circus-Circus and walked over to SOF to play some low limit craps but the table wasn’t open yet so I went over to the Ho again. I played here for a little while but lost $60. Typical of what happens when I play this game, as soon as I load the board up with come bets and odds the shooter (including myself) always 7’s out.

After this I went back up to the room and read the paper and rested for a little while. Even though it is only 10:30 I was dragging my ass already. I took a short break and then it was time to go over to the Flamingo for a meet that was organized on the Las Vegas Advisor message board. Oddly there wasn’t much traffic on the strip and I made my way down to Bally’s where I valet parked. I think Bally’s has one of the best valets in town and whenever I’m going center strip I park there. After dropping off the car I walked over to the Flamingo. There wasn’t a big turn out for the meet, just 4 or 5 people.

After the meet I went over to the Barbary Coast. I had some coupons that they mailed me for free food, cash, and gifts. One coupon was good for prime rib or T-bone dinner for 2. There was a 20-minute wait to get into the Victorian room so I went over to the slot club and got new cards. They have finally converted the Barbary Coast slot club to be the same as all of the other Coasts and the card readers use magnetic cards instead of those primitive cards with the holes punched in them. I also got my gift while I was there. It was a clock with a light on it with the Barbary Coast logo on it.

After a while I heard my name called to the dining room. I ordered the T-bone. The meal also comes with a salad, rolls, potato, and beverage. The steak was very good and cooked perfect.

After dinner I played some deuces wild. Things didn’t work out too well here. I actually had started out ok but lost my first buy in. I tried again with a $50 bill and went through the whole thing hitting only 1 4-of-a-kind. I didn’t get much play here for my money and decided it was time to leave.

I went over to the Hard Rock after this. It was still a little early so it wasn’t jam packed yet. I wanted to play some craps but the one table they had open was packed. I was wandering around and saw one of the new Harley Davidson slots. It’s your typical multi-line, multi-coin game. This game also has a wide area progressive. It’s a pretty good game and the sound effects and graphics are great. This bank was right outside the sports book so I could see the big screen while playing. At one point I looked up and saw Hulk Hogan on the screen. It was 8pm and time for WWE Smackdown on UPN. Regular readers of my reports know I’m a big fan of the WWE. How great was this I thought? I’m in Las Vegas, I’m gambling, I have a big-boobed waitress bringing me free beers, I’ve got Sports Center on one giant screen and WWE Smackdown on another, good tunes in the background and half naked girls walking past trying to be part of the “in” crowd at the Hard Rock. This is the life!

I got quite a bit of play on the slot I was playing but eventually lost. It took almost 3 hours to go through my $20 buy in. Since I was done playing but Smackdown wasn’t done yet I went over to the Sportsbook since it was actually closed and grabbed a seat to watch the rest of the show. There was quite a crowd in there too. One note about the Hard Rock sportsbook, it’s small but the chairs are pretty comfortable.

After Smackdown was over there were a few more craps tables open. I finally got over there to play. The table was pretty good at first but then it got bad. I lost here after about 2 hours of play. It was about midnight now so I headed back here to finish up my day and go to bed.

Total win/loss for the day -$500
Total comps for the day $77