Day 13
April 8, 2000
The alarm went off at 4:30 just like I had set it. I wish it hadn’t though. It was Saturday morning but as far as I could tell it was still Friday night. I looked out the window and it was still dark and all the lights were still on. That didn’t matter though. My trip was now just about over and it was time to head back home to New York. After getting ready and packing up the last of my things I checked the TV for my account status to make sure there were no surprises or charges that didn’t belong there. I was happy to see that all the charges were mine. There was however a surprise. I was on the $19 rate for the first 3 nights and on Friday my rate was $129. This is where the surprise was. The dopes only charged me $19 for the Friday night!!!! Thinking this was too good to be true I didn’t check out using the TV. Instead I made a beeline directly to the check out desk. They still had me I at $19 and I got a printed receipt as well. They must have thought the $129 was a mistake and changed it to match my other nights. Normally I don’t like surprises on my hotel bill but this was one I didn’t mind.

After checking out I got my car at the valet and took one last trip up the strip. I had to stop for gas before dropping the car off at Alamo. I picked the AM/PM out in front of the Excalibur. They were 20 cents a gallon cheaper than the 76 station out by Holiday Inn Boardwalk at $1.79 a gallon. After filling up it was on my way to Alamo. Things went smooth here and I got right on the shuttle to the airport.

When I got to the airport everything went well and they had my reservation all set for me. I had also been upgraded to first class. This was a treat since it had been quite a while since I’ve flown in first class. It was nice to have a drink before taking off too. After taking off we were offered our choice of meals for breakfast. The first choice was cereal which was Rice Chex and that came with bananas. The other choice was a cheddar cheese omelet that came with French toast. After eating eggs all week the cereal sure sounded good but I couldn’t pass up a hot meal on a first class flight. Before the actual meal came out we were served a fruit plate that had cantaloupe slices, honey dew chunks, 2 grapes, 2 slices of orange, a slice of grapefruit and 1 strawberry. All the fruit was fresh and full of flavor. While we were eating that we were also offered a croissant or a cinnamon biscuit. I chose the biscuit. Shortly after the main meal was served. The omelet had a cheese sauce in the middle that exploded when I cut into it. Luckily I didn’t make a mess. There was 1 triangle of French toast and there was also a big slab of ham with a pineapple slice. Everything was great except the pineapple slice. That tasted like plastic. They also handed out headsets and we got to watch the in-flight movie which, was Stewart Little. This was kind of a stupid movie about a family that was adopting a kid and ended up adopting a mouse. It was geared towards kids. I watched about ½ of it then fell asleep. When I woke up it was just about over so I switched to the music selection. They had some great tunes from groups like The Rolling Stones, Aerosmith, Billy Joel, Led Zeppelin, and a few others. I fell asleep again listening to this and woke up to the smell of chocolate chip cookies baking. I thought I was imagining it or that maybe someone ripped one and it wasn’t really cookies I smelled. I was right the first time. We got served hot chocolate chip cookies and milk. I must have slept a lot longer than I thought I did because the captain came on said we were going to be at the gate in about 25 minutes.

We ended up landing a few minutes early. Then it was time to fight baggage claim. Newark is famous for taking their sweet ass time getting your bags back to you. About 30 minutes later I finally had my bag and went outside to meet my aunt and uncle who were picking me up. One I got into the car I knew I vacation was over. We had to go into New York City to pick up my cousin. Yuck. What a dump this city is compared to Las Vegas! I missed it already and the countdown began to July 13, 2000!

Total win/loss for the day $0
Total comps for the day $0

Final Thoughts

• The Blackjack tables were very streaky for me this trip. They were either very good to me or very bad. There was no in between.
• Video poker was a little kinder but wasn’t that great either. I played about 85,000 hands of video poker this trip. I did hit 2 royal flushes. On average you should hit one about every 40,000 hands so I got my share. Unfortunately they were both on a nickel machine. (About 10 minutes apart from each other)
• I gambled much less than I normally do because I was there with some friends. Spending time with them was more fun than the terrible losing streaks I was going through.
• Sassy Sally’s has been rethemed and renamed Mermaids. Don’t be fooled by this though. It’s still the same old shit hole it always was. Do yourself a favor and stay away. Also keep in mind that the other shit hole, Coin Castle was rethemed and renamed La Bayou.
• Late night food specials are getting harder to find. There are still tons of them out there but most places don’t advertise them anymore. The best of the late night specials still exists although it’s $1.99 more than it used to be. That would of course be the steak special at Binion’s Horseshoe.
• My total comp level was much higher than it usually is. I think this was from the fact that I was in a $300 a night suite at Sam’s Town. My meal comps were lower then normal this trip though. I think that was mainly from eating less than I usually do.
• Flying first class is really nice. This is the way to go if you are flying cross-country. It’s not worth paying 15-20 times the regular fares to do it though.
• Bally’s is great hotel in a great location. While I am one to try to never pay for rooms in Las Vegas I was more than happy I turned down complimentary nights at other hotels to pay the $19 rate they were running.
• I had the Big Kitchen Buffet 2 times for breakfast at Bally’s. I thought it was good but not really worth the $10 price tag that came with it.
• My next trip starts on July 13, 2000. I arrive in Las Vegas at 9:18pm
• I didn’t do very well on free pull promotions this trip. Bally’s offers one free pull per day for a chance to win $1,000,000. One day I won a key chain. I didn’t win my usual 50 cents at Slots of fun. Does anyone ever hit anything more on those machines? The most I ever saw was a lady in front of me won $2.50. I didn’t have any luck on the 4 Queens free video poker hand either.
• This was my 7th trip in a row that I was a winner. Of 11 trips I have taken I have won 7 times, lost 3, and broke even once.

Total win/loss for the trip $ 100
Total comps for the trip $2089