I Won $300

Last Friday I was sitting on my porch with and Old Style in hand, just home from a hard morning in the research lab (taking it in the rear by misbehaving centrifuges), and a hard afternoon at The Still pouring our Eagle Rare 10 year, Single Barrel Bourbon. My neighbor Shane O'Mac comes wandering up to the steps and I ask,

"Shane, what do you have on tap this evening?"
"Eh, not much. Why?"
"Let's go to the casino..."
"When do you want to go?"
"As soon as possible."
"O.K., I'm in"

So, we are driving down 27th on our way to I-80 East, but first we must stop for gas. I see a station that is selling unleaded for $2.63 (which is a hell of deal), thus I pull in. As I am filling, a kind 40ish Latino man pulls up, bumping some merenge/mariachi music. He says to me,

"Hey, you going to the state fair?"
"No."
"Where are you from?"
"Illinois."
"Where are you going?"
"The casino, in Council Bluffs."
"Ooooooh, well may the saintos grant you luck and happiness."
(What the fuck?? Mexican Saintos blessings for the casino....is that fair??)
"Thanks....later"

We get to the new Binion's Horseshoe because we all want to be Binionaires and we walk in. I get sassed for my Illinois driver's license with my online renewal sticker on the back and have to tell them how old I am, which becomes a problem. Very rarely am I asked how old am I, even worse, everytime someone asks me my mind goes blank and I have to add it up in my head. Ask me my birthday, I rattle it off; Ask me how old I am, I'm like a lost duck. This guy meanwhile is waiting for me to add it up in my head, probably thinking I'm underage and have a fake ID, but I do finally get it right. However, the old guy is curious now and so he asks me my address. And I'm like 'oh, shit. Is it my home address in Decatur, my apartment address from sophore year in college, my apartment address from junior year in college, or my apartment address from MS?' So I go to old reliable, Decatur address and it works! I'm in the horseshoe.

Now Shane and I go to get our rewards cards, because we want comps and we want to be tracked. Turns out that the Horseshoe will reimburse us up to $500 in losses our first day at the casino, and if we play slots or a table game for 30 minutes we get free buffet.

Figure that the best bet for free buffet is penny slots. We sit down at two $0.02 slot machines and each put in $20. About 3 minutes in I'm up to $70 and I lean over and yell at Shane, "Hey man, I'm up $50." He leans over and says "Hey, I'm up....I don't know, but I have 15,000 credits" ($300) I yell over, "Cash out...wait, 15,000 credits....when did you hit that?" He says, "Third pull, I just was hitting buttons, I didn't know what they did." We end up playing slots so long that the buffet closes. On top of that, I'm only up $20 and Shane's only up $220.

But the real action that night was at the craps table. In the first 5 minutes I lost $70. Over the next 45 minutes I pulled down about $700. In the last 5 minutes I lost $200. I walked in with $200 in my pocket and out with $525. Now I have the funds to buy my Nintendo Wii.