Day 6
December 18, 1999
Up early to get ready to go to the Hard Rock for a video poker tournament. While getting ready I tuned in to WWF Livewire on USA Network to catch up on all the happenings in the WWF the past week. As you might remember from some of my previous trip reports I’m a big fan of wrestling.
Off to the Hard Rock to register for the tournament. When I found out about this tournament I emailed the Hard Rock for information about it but it was originally only for member of Skip Hughs’ mailing list. Since I wasn’t a member I wasn’t allowed in. A few weeks later I got an e-mail from Debbie Oddo and she told me it was now open to Back Stage Pass holders. (The Hard Rock’s Slot Club). I set this whole thing up through e-mail with her. The tournament was a $100 entry fee with a $5,000 top prize. Included with the entry was a coupon good for double points when they start the new slot club in January and a gift, which was a leather fanny pack, embroidered with the Hard Rock logo. These sell for $16 in the gift shop. I was in the second session so I had some time to play some full pay deuces. I was hitting wild royals one after another and then the machine went dead. Finally cashed out down $50 and it was time for my session. All the machines were 8/5 bonus in this tournament. You started with 1000 credits and played for 20 minutes or until they were gone. I didn’t do very well hitting only one full house and 2 flushes. No quads at all. After the tournament I got my 6 pack fun book which has coupons for 2X points when you earn at least 5, $15 for $10 in coin when you earn 3 points, 2X pay on a table game win, free bud or bud light, fee shot glass or playing cards in the gift shop, and a free sundae or chicken wings in Mr. Lucky’s 24/7 coffee shop. Played some triple play video poker and cashed out even after an hour. I racked up a total of 33 points today, which will be doubled to 66 with in 48 hours. Points are worth $1 each for comps. I got a comp for Mr. Lucky’s 24/7 coffee shop and went to dinner. I had a turkey sandwich that was very good. After dinner I went to the gift shop to get my free shot glass and then left to head up to The Reserve in Henderson.
The Reserve is offering 4X points on Saturday and Sunday. Points here are worth .1% for cash or .2% for comps. Tonight they were worth 4 times that. I started off with some single deck blackjack but the dealer was on fire at this table. I quickly moved away to another table. Played for about 1 ½ hours here and cashed out up $500. I colored up my chips and they gave me a purple one. When I got the window to cash in the cashier immediately runs to the phone. I hate when they do this. It makes me feel like a criminal. Tried my luck with some quarter 5 play jacks or better. The last time I played these for quarters I got killed in a hurry. Today was a little bit different though. I played for an hour and a half and cashed out up $100. Moved over to a $1 progressive deuces wild machine. It was short pay on the wild royals and the 5 of a kind. Lost $200 here and then headed back to the blackjack tables. Played some double deck this time. Got in another 2 hours of play and won another $400. Colored up and got a comp to Congo Jack’s coffee shop. Of course when I got to the window to cash in my chips they went running to the phone again. I stood there for atleast 10 minutes before being paid. The lady came back and apologized telling me they had to call the pit to verify when a purple chip ($500) was brought to the window. She called 3 pits before getting the one I came from. I asked what would happen if I had left without cashing it in and came back another time to cash it in what would happen. She just gave me a dumb look and said she didn’t know. I told her I knew it wasn’t her fault but it was a stupid thing to have to do. I told her I’d solve that problem by not getting purples at the tables anymore.
After finally getting my money I went to dinner. There were no crowds here but I sat at the counter anyway. The service is usually faster this way. Had the hot roast beef dinner. It was roast beef and real mashed potatoes and gravy. It also came with soup. Tonight’s soup was some meatball vegetable stuff. It was a bit spicy and had these giant meatballs in it. It was pretty good. The roast beef was good too.
After dinner went and played some more $1 video poker but couldn’t hit any quads. I put a $100 into one machine and only got $50 credits. I was wondering if I had only put a $50 in and then realized I was on a $2 machine. I played it anyway but couldn’t get any quads here either. I did get over an hours worth of play before losing it. After this I decided to give up for the night. I ran over $12,000 through the machines tonight racking up over 50,000 points on my card. I now have over 90,000 points here at the Reserve. I can probably eat here every day for a month and still have points left. It was getting late so I headed back down to the Strip and back to the room. I had to start packing up and getting ready for the move to the Flamingo Hilton tomorrow.
Total win/loss for the day $200
Total comps for the day $104