Day 2
Tuesday March 28, 2000
Slept late today even though my plan was to get up early and get a little play in before heading downtown. I woke up at 10am and I didn’t know it yet but this would be the gambling day from hell, mostly from my own stupidity though.
After getting ready I headed for the downtown area and to Main Street Station. There was a meet that was organized on the Las Vegas Talk Message Board by Buddha and myself with some help from VG from VG Enterprises who is also a regular contributor to the message board. I got there early so I walked over to the California and got a slot card. I went to a double deck Blackjack table and bought in for $100. Quickly doubled my money and then it was time to get back over to Main Street Station for the meet. This meet was originally going to be held at the VP bar in the back corner of the casino but quite a few people showed up so we moved it to the 777 Brew Pub. All of the people from the meet are readers of the message board and included Walker from TN, Carolyn and Vinny from Brandon, FL, Bob, Buddha, myself and of course VG and Frank, the webmaster for the Las Vegas Talk Discussion Board and Las Vegas On-Line.
For lunch here I had a chicken finger platter. It was a whole chicken breast cut into 3 strips, french fries and served with cole slaw and dipping sauces for $6. I also had a Coke that came in what must have been the world’s largest glass.
After the meet I walked over to Binion’s Horseshoe for some single deck Blackjack. Played for nearly 2 hours winning $500. Walked over to the 4 Queens to take a free play on their promotional video poker machine. I lost. Walked back up towards Main Street Station on Fremont Street and saw they had renovated Sassy Sally’s. It’s now called Mermaids. They did a nice job on the front of the building making it look colorful and appealing but they did almost nothing with the inside. As far as I could see it was still that dirty nasty shit hole that Sassy Sally’s was. The only difference was that instead of toothless skanks offering a free spin out from they had some cleaner girls out front dressed more like Rio Rita than like mermaids. Do yourself a favor and avoid this dump.
After looking over Mermaids I took my customary walk through the Plaza to see if it had been cleaned up at all. While the carpet looks like it’s been there for 40 years, they do have quite a good selection of new machines. I spotted a 50-play video poker machine and had to give it a try, even though I really am not a fan of the Plaza. I set the machine for nickel play (you can also choose dimes or quarters) Even at nickels this is still $12.50 a hand. These machines can be vacuum cleaners if you aren’t dealt any winning hands. Most hands you will win back around 100 coins but I had a few where I won back as few as 30. I was playing a short pay version of Deuces Wild. I was doing ok, getting my fair share of dealt hands. Then I got a junk hand which I dumped all 5 cards. On the draw I got a Royal Flush on line #31. If that wasn’t enough about 10 minutes later I held 3 cards to a royal and connected one on line #21. Also hit 6 sets of deuces during this session. Even with hitting all of this I only walked away with a $100 profit. These machines are tough if you aren’t hitting. Since they have no slot club here I didn’t get any credit for my play. I did play for about an hour and a half and estimating at 600 hands per hour that I ran over $11,000 through this machine and played about 45,000 hands.
Went back to Sam’s Town for dinner at Smokey Joe’s. I had the honey mustard chicken, which was very good. It also came with their famous soup and salad bar. I don’t know what made it so famous but that’s what it says on their menus.
After dinner I decided to try some $1 video poker. Lost $300 fairly quickly and couldn’t hit a quad. I even tried playing $100 through a $5 machine with no luck there either.
Moved over to Blackjack where I proceeded to get my ass kicked even more. Moved to another table and lost $500 in what seemed to be record time. Having no luck at the tables I went over to a Triple Play Deuces Wild machine. I hit the deuces after only about 5 minutes. Lost my original $100 cashing out up by $150. Hoping the tables may have cooled off I tried some more Blackjack. Things started out ok but then went downhill from there. I moved to another table and things sucked worse at this table than at the previous table. I moved to yet another table with a few black chips ($100) and decided to bet them. Things started out good. Got some blackjacks and hit a few doubles. Then things changed for the worse. I bought in for another $500 and things stayed bad. Ended up losing that too. At this point I was down $1800 for the trip and it was only day 2. I had $200 left to play with and decided what the hell. Let’s play it. Went to a table and started out betting $25 on 2 hands head to head with the dealer. A few people came to the table including 2 ladies from Indiana. They were in Las Vegas to have fun and sure were having it. They brought a lot of energy to the table. They had never played Blackjack where you pick up the cards so they had to actually learn all the rules and customs of this game. They also seemed surprised when they tied that it was a push and got to keep their money. Apparently on the riverboats in Indiana THE HOUSE KEEPS THE TIE as if Blackjack wasn’t hard enough to win at. I then asked them if they actually play that game and they said they do. I changed from 2 bets of $25 each to one of $50. Things were going ok here. After about 2 hours I was up over $800 at this table. I wasn’t making a ton of money quick here but I was at least getting to play and not losing. One guy on the end of the table bought in for $100 and ended up cashing out $2,000. He was a happy player. The ladies from Indiana were starting to lose so said they were going to the Red Rooster. I don’t think they were kidding about going there either. (The Red Rooster is a swingers club). Anyway, enough about them. At 4 am at shift change a new dealer came into the game. Everyone else was gone and it was just me and the dealer, playing head to head. I moved to black chip action and about 1 hour later cashed out with $2050 finishing up by $50 for the day. This was a great finish but the only bad thing was I had just won over $1800 and it put me even.
Went back to the room at about 5am took a quick Jacuzzi, had a snack and then went to bed at about 6am.
Total win/loss for the day $50
Total comps for the day $309