Breaking the rules.

There is something about the smell of a casino I love. Maybe It's the combination of stale cigarettes and beer mixed with the rich aromas of good buffet food. Maybe it's the anticipation or the vibe these places emit. You feel like you're welcome no matter what your status. Maybe there is an aura of excitement or hope. Or it could just be that I was born in Las Vegas and it just seems familiar to me. Whatever it is, it makes me feel good.

When we arrived in Tunica, we had two immediate goals. First, we had to locate L's favorite slot machine in our favorite casino. She loves this machine and I can understand why. It's paid her off every time. Last time it gave her almost 3K. We had a $25 dollar coupon that we were going to give to THGLC (The Human Good Luck Charm) if he managed to make the trip with us and we also had a coupon for a free dinner buffet. So we burned through our free twenty five bucks and had a fabulous (always tastes batter when it's free) buffet. Our second goal was to get me signed up for the WSOP (World Series Of Poker) tournament at another casino. I plopped down my three hundred bucks and we were off to check in at our own hotel. Our plan was to get nice and toasty while playing at our base of operations ad do the serious gambling the next day.
After check in, we went our separate ways. She bolted to the slots and I to the poker room. Neither one of us did any good. I played $3/$6 limit hold-em and got beat like a red headed step child. Limit games are lame. Whatever skill is involved in poker is not a factor in limit games. You can't bluff any one out of a pot. You can't raise enough to scare anyone off their hand. Basically ever one throws money in the pot and, after the last card is turned, a winner is declared. There is much more luck involved. I don't like it. It's not my game. I didn't want to play limit at all. They just didn't have a no limit game going on at the time. After the first night, L had lost over half of her money and I had half of mine tied up in the tourney I was to play the next day. After some excellent nookie,we retired for the night.

We woke up with renewed hope. Our breakfast was comped thanks to L's bad luck at the slots and her little electronic comp card. Things were looking up already. After breakfast we hauled over to the casino hosting the WSOP event. I sat and chain smoked while I waited for the thing to start. Once they announced the start of the event L headed for her favorite slot and I was on my own facing over six hundred opponents. I felt good about my skills and even better to be back in my no limit comfort zone. I made it through the first two blind intervals. I was blessed with good cards and cursed with bad flops. I was forced to go all in once and managed to double up my short stack. Alas, my good reads and ability were not enough to save me from bad luck though. My stack was dwindling and my final had went like this.

Ace of hearts King of clubs in late position. I push all in over the 100 chip blind with six hundred. Every one folds but one person. To call my bet he must risk half of his own chips. He calls with Jack of hearts and Ten of hearts. The flop is 7, K, K two are hearts. I have trip kings! The turn is the six of spades. I only need to dodge a heart in order to double up. The river is a 3 of hearts and my trip Kings with an Ace kicker goes down to his flush. My WSOP hopes are dashed. At least he had to think long and hard before he made the call. As far as I'm concerned, I did quite well for my first WSOP outing. I made all the right moves as far as I can tell. I made zero mistakes. Now If I could get some other luck besides the bad kind I'd be in fantastic shape.
So L picks me up and we head back to the casino where she has been playing here favorite slot. She's been up and down but almost even for the day. I retreat to the poker room once I get there. I sit down with my last hundred bucks. I play for a couple hours with this money. My last hand I had Ace King and again got chased down to the river where my opponent caught his flush to beat me. SOB! Twice I lost all my money like that. L was sitting behind me when I lost. She had gone down to zero as well.

We went back to home base dejected but happy we could get a good free meal before we checked out early and went home. We ate dinner and tipped the waiter with change from her purse. Refusing to die, she collected every last coin to trade for a grand total of two dollars cash. She went to the cashier and I followed. She traded her coins for paper (very few slots actually take or pay coins anymore). we walked around the casino and chose a machine to put our last two dollars cash. We settled one and turned our two dollars into five on our last spin. Cashing out, we rolled to the high limit slots, put our five bucks in, and WON!!! We hit a six thousand dollar jackpot!

That last part about the jackpot wasn't true. I just couldn't resist. No, we actually lost our last five dollars. We went to our room dejected. This is where we broke the cardinal rule of gambling. We decided to go to the ATM and get another one hundred dollars each. We went back to our favorite casino and I headed for the poker room and she for her slots. We must have been channeling THGLC because we made the comeback from hell. I turned my hundred bucks into four hundred and she hit a couple good spins. We quickly turned our measly two hundred bucks into one thousand between the two of us. We were still shy of what we brought and decided to head back to home base again with at least something. Once we arrived at our hotel we decided to get drunk playing quarter machines. We each took a hundred bucks and decided to sit in a heavily trafficked area in order to get our free drinks on. We played for hours and got really drunk. We kept on winning. After we were done we had some great drunken sex to cap everything off. It was the greatest comeback ever!

The net result. Minus gas. We came home with two hundred and eighty dollars more than we left with. The room was free, the food was free, and the gas was paid for with winnings. Sometimes rules are for breaking.

Cotton fields and casinos.

It's about a seven hour drive from where I live to Tunica, MS. Why didn't we fly you ask? Well, because plane rental is expensive and commercial plane travel isn't much faster than driving. If your flying anywhere, no matter how short the hop, on an airline it takes about six hours.

Drive to the airport: 45 min
Shuttle to the terminal: 15 min
Early for security/check in: 2hrs
Flight: 45 min
Baggage claim: 15-45 min (if they haven't lost your bags)
Car rental: 15-45 min
Trip to destination: 15-45 minutes

So the money I would spend on "saving time" by flying is a complete waste (at least until I get my own plane).

We had a long car ride which is always fun for me. We talked and laughed our seven hour car ride away. I'm usually not in a big rush, so we were able to stop and smell the roses here and there. A big breakfast at I-HOP (mmmm stuffed french toast), a stop at a flea market (she likes to find interesting/cheap furniture to repair), snacks at the gas station were all stops along the way.

One of our stops was at a KFC to use the bathroom. On our way out we passed those little vending machines that sell bubble gum and trinkets.

She asks me "Why do they all call them super balls?"

I resist the urge to reply with dumb man humor and say "You've never had a super bouncy ball from a machine like this?"

"No."

I dig in my pocket and whip out a quarter and put it in the machine. She cranks the handle and a little blue and white ball with a "10" on it pops out. It looks like a pool ball. She immediately remarks how the cats might like the ball and gives it a bounce. Like every super bouncy ball in history, it boings twice as high the owner intends and goes off in an unforeseen direction. I immediately start to grin as this is exactly what I expected to happen from a woman who had been deprived of this simple childhood toy. There was a young couple in the restaurant and the laughter erupted as my wife, giggling the whole time, chased down the ball. We walked out together and the couple inside was still laughing. L couldn't resist the urge to try the ball again. This time she was prepared and did a couple small bounces on the way to the car. She kept catching the tiny sphere with both hands like she was trying to capture rain water to drink. It was precious. Two rough looking guys with in an old Pontiac looked on and smiled at my wife and her joy. It was a fun drive.

Tunica is probably much like Vegas was in the very early days of its existence. Its a fly speck on the atlas. There is nothing around for miles unless you count cotton fields. As a matter of fact, the fields butt right up to the casino parking lots in some cases. We drove through the country roads, winding our way to our destination. It was harvest time and cotton that escaped the machines blew across the roads and collected in patches like snow. L had never touched raw cotton and begged me to stop. We were close now and I could smell the dead money at the poker tables. I didn't want to stop but I did. She hopped out of the car and grabbed a small piece. I remembered raw cotton being a little more harsh or coarse than a cotton ball but this stuff was truly soft. She declared that it was going in our scrap book and we were off to collect our winnings. Soon the lights started to appear on the horizon. We made it.

Linked question.

Question of the week and comments here.

Meez the day.

Activity of the week: Bus building.

Post 100

Holy crap! 100 posts of geekness. I can't believe I've managed to write a hundred words. Maybe I'm kicking this lazy streak that's in me. Probably not, but it's fun to think I may be growing despite my age. Thanks for stopping in to read about my mundane life. And thanks for the comments most of all. They mean more than you could possibly know.

Next week I'll be playing in a WSOP event. I'm way excited to butt heads with some serious poker players and test my metal. My goal is to, at least, get my money back. In order to win, I'll have to make zero mistakes and have quite a large chunk of luck. It promises to be a fun experience no matter what.

The wrong reaction.

L calls me the yesterday and says "I may be pregnant." like a typical man I completely give the wrong response. "Oh crap." were my exact words. Definitely not what she wanted to hear and not how I really felt. We've been kicking around the kid thing again. I can tell that she is having biological clock issues. She has been dropping hints and pointing out particularly cute little ones in our daily travels. In spite of my years of mortal fear of having a kid, not because I don't want any but because of all the things that can go wrong, I was surprisingly calm at the idea of having a child. After my fumbled attempts at recovering from my verbal misstep I hung up the phone and sat in silence for a while. I wasn't scared. There was no fear whatsoever. I felt a warmth growing inside of me at the prospect of being a dad. Maybe I'm ready. Maybe it's time. I have plenty to offer a child. I would be more involved in its life than either my real father or my step father. I'm capable of sharing my love with a little one. Maybe there is a need for me to impart what knowledge I've obtained in my life to a kid. L and I had a long discussion when I got home. I made her understand that my phone reaction was just an verbal stupidity and not my true feelings. It turns out that the pregnancy was a false alarm, but today my life has a whole new perspective. Nothing is written in stone yet but we're thinking of having a go at this parent stuff.

Question of the week:

Based on what you've read here in my blog, does the thought of me with offspring make you weep for the future? Be honest. I can take it.

Even 3.5 day weekends are too short.

Sunday I got off my mid shift and went straight to a VW show. I had a great time with my boy SNT who also had the mid and is slowly being converted into a VW geek (insert evil laugh of choice here.) It was in the beautiful Georgia mountains. The weather was perfect, I saw a ton of cool cars and picked up some parts for my buggy. Even though it was a tow hour trip each way, I didn't feel the lack of sleep catching up to me until much later that night after I had been up for over 36 hours straight. I slept like a rock.

Monday L. miraculously got the day off. I spent Monday fixing the lawn mower and mowing the grass (aka weeds.) We spent the rest of the day shopping for art. We needed a painting to go in our dining room. My brother D. and his family are coming in November and it will be the first time they have seen my house so we decided it was a good excuse to get it now (thank you VISA.) We drove around all over the place, bought expensive coffee, and had a wonderful lunch. We found a beautiful painting in an import store and we both knew it was what we wanted the second we saw it. It was only two hundred bucks and we snatched it up. It is an oil painting of a forest in front of a lake in early autumn. The colors are beautiful and the sky is a gold leaf color that makes it pop off the wall under light. It sounds a little funny as I type this but, take my word for it, it's beautiful on our wall.

Tuesday was my friend T's birthday. We met he and his wife over at the local Japanese steak house. This was only the second time I'd ever been to one of these types of restaurants. I never went back to one because I wasn't impressed with my first experience. Greatgooglymoogly it was FANTASTIC this time! If it wasn't for the eighty dollar tab I would be eating there at least three times a week. After dinner we went back to T's house for some adult beverages, a round of poker, and one of those big ole birthday cookies you get in the mall.

Wednesday was my down time. I slept in late and, pretty much goofed off the whole day. L and I met T and his wife for dinner at a local bar and had a good time discussing what we would do with our lotto winnings. We intended to play poker in the local little bar league but evidently the game was canceled. No worries. Drinks and food were good enough for me.

I woke up early this morning because I had to get something done to my buggy before the evil work week started. I piddled in the garage for about two hours and then got ready for work.

A smile is worth a million words.

Hate is a strong word. In my thirty three years of existence I've never really hated anyone in my life. Sure there were the times my mom denied me the opportunity to do things when I was young and I told her I hated her like every other little kid on the planet but I never really hated anyone until a couple years back. I know I hate him because I still have contempt for him even after two years. I still bump into this person every now and then and I instantly go into a fight or flight response. I never say what is on my mind when I see him, which if you've read any of this blog, takes a great feat of composure for me. It was malicious and evil of him to do what he did. It's not so much the act of trying to ruin my career but the manner in which he did it. In truth he thought, and still probably does, that he was just doing his job. I understand this but it doesn't make me hate him any less. The sad thing is that, as far as I know, I never did anything or said anything to upset him. He pretty much decided that he didn't like me and made it known through his actions.

I've learned a great deal from this experience and for that I'm grateful. One lesson that I've taken is I will never get over major issues until there a confrontation in some form or another. No, I don't want to harm him in any way. I do, however, want to get my feelings out in the open because I believe that he has no clue how much hatred I have for him and what he did. Second, I've said it before and I'll say it again...Stand up for what you believe in. It hurts more to bottle it up. I'm not saying to go postal or anything like that but getting your words out is very therapeutic. Don't tell a shrink or a sympathetic ear but the one who needs to hear it most. And the most important of lessons taken from this is I look mean when I don't smile. A smile is the only immediately recognizable facial expression. All others and be misinterpreted but a smile is unmistakable. I stopped at a quickie mart the other day to get a pack of smokes or something. As I walked up to the door I saw my reflection in the window. Wholly shit I looked like an evil bastard. Hell, even I was scared of me. Unfortunately we are all subject to peoples preconceived notions of who we are based on visual impressions. The only way to mitigate this is to come across more friendly. So every time I see him from now on I'll clench my teeth together and smile.

We need some fashion police too.

I was firing up the internet to do my traditional surfing and I saw this on the MSN page. I knew I liked the Spanish for some reason. The thing that bothers me is that the government is the one who stepped in.

Speaking of money I don't have.

On my drive to work I noticed a new Starbucks is opening. How the hell am I going to avoid this place? I stopped shopping at the local Target because they have the infamous coffee house inside. I couldn't manage to go in for whatever I was looking for without walking out carrying a Venti Cafe Mocha. Sometimes I would go out of my way to get something at Target that I could've purchased anywhere else in order to make the pit stop on my way out. To make matters worse, WalMart was the last place I could get my favorite coffee beans (Folgers French Vanilla) and it seems they have stopped stocking it. The last four times I went in they were out. This new Starbucks has a drive through so I won't even have to get out of my car to get my crizzy fix. If they take credit cards I'm screwed. Four dollar cups of irresistible coffee will be my downfall.

Question of the week:

We all have that one thing we can't resist. What's yours? No blubbering about the one you love because that goes without saying.

Money I don't have.

Last week I bought another project VW. L, being the sweet woman she is, let me get away with it. To be honest, she likes the thing as much (if not more) than I do. I found a '67 microbus for sale online and snatched it up for $250. It has an engine tranny and everything. The kicker about this one is that it is one of the most rust free busses I've ever seen. I've been doing some checking and these things can go anywhere from $6000 to $25,000 bucks.

The bad part about the van is that it's been butchered up like hell so it will never fall into the 25K category. This is just fine by me because I don't buy cars to have them sit in the garage and collect dust. Cars are for driving. If you're a VW geek like me this thing has cool written all over it.

Now the heat is on to get the dune buggy finished so I can move this new project into the garage. It's given me a new sense of urgency to get the buggy done. The bus don't look like much now but in my minds eye it's friggin killer dude.

On a side note. This picture was taken in my yard or as I like to call it "the rain forest." The bus is parked in a little turn around next to my driveway. The main road is probably two hundred feet past the van. It's like my own little private nature preserve. I love it.

Lesson learned.

Back in the early nineties, while still in the Army, was when I came to the realization that I can not handle hard liqueur. Early on, during my time in, I was under age so I couldn't drink at the bars. This actually worked out well for me. Every Friday night a bunch of us would pile into a car and make the fifty mile drive to Nashville to party. I was always the designated driver for the ride home. Since I was infamous for this service, I always got a free ride to town every Friday. This was especially handy for a guy with no car and no intention of buying one. So it became my goal to get as tasty as possible before we left for town. I would drink as much as possible as fast as possible prior to departure. I would be buzzing good when we arrived and completely sober at last call to drive my drunk buddies back to base. Needless to say, I didn't build a good tolerance this way. When I finally turned 21, I had no idea what my limits were.

Shortly after I was legal to drink in bars, I would find times where I would get completely hammered and hung over and times I was just fine. I was young and stupid so it took a specific event for me to realize that liqueur was the culprit. When I drank beer I was fine and drunken stupidity didn't sneak up on me. The heavy stuff would just kill me.

The event.

Ford was my roommate. He was a pretty cool dude. We picked up some tickets to a Van Halen concert for the weekend in question. It was a general admission venue and we left early. While leaving post we decided to get some beverages. I picked up a bottle of Seagram's 7 (My drink of choice was 7&7 and to this day I have no idea why) and stopped at a 7-11 where I bought a 44oz Big Gulp of 7-Up. I spent the next hour in the car (I wasn't driving) sipping from my 44oz cup. Each sip I took made room for a little more Seagram's until the mixture was pretty much 99.99% alcohol. When we arrived at the exit for the stadium, a line of cars had already formed along the shoulder on the interstate. We took our place in line behind a ford pick-up that had three women sitting in the bench seat. As the line crept along the passengers in the truck would take turns flashing us. Ford and I agreed that it was going to be a very good night and I'm sure he had a good time. As we pulled into the parking lot/field I took time to notice that my 44oz cup was empty as well as the bottle of Seagram's Seven. I had a little buzz going and I felt great.
We herded ourselves into the venue with the rest of the cattle and found our spot in the grass. We decided were close enough to see the expressions on Eddie's face and far enough that we wouldn't get crushed by the masses swarming the stage. It was a good spot and I was feeling waaaaaay good at this point. I sat on the grass as the dusk settled in. I watched the sun go down and enjoyed playing back stage pass (B.S.P.) with Ford while waiting for the bands to fire up. B.S.P. consisted of picking the sluttiest girls out of the crowd and arguing with each other weather they were worthy of meeting the band. When we saw hot ones we would yell out "B.S.P.!" and get strange looks form groups of women. It was good times until the opening band took the stage. This is when the whiskey decided to exact its revenge. I grew increasingly more unsteady and needed to sit down. I complied with my bodies demands and plopped down on my butt.

Sitting down was the last thing I remembered until aroused later my roomie and some dude resembling Hyde from That '70's Show. When they pulled me to my feet, it was evident that VH was in the middle of their set. Ford knew where my next stop needed to be. I must've thrown up for 20 minutes straight. When I finally finished, I ran into ford outside the bathroom. He looked at me with true concern on his face.

"Dude," I yelled over the excessive decibels "I'm heading back to the car! Have a good time!"
He said something back to me but either I didn't hear it or just didn't care. I headed back to the parking lot and left ole Ford to the B.S.P.s and Hyde.

I wandered the sea of cars looking for his little back sports car. By some miracle I managed to find it. It was only then that I realized I didn't have the keys. I wondered (for about a millisecond) if that was what Ford was trying to tell me as I left. My next move was to sit on the ground in front of the car with my back to the grill and my head on the low sloping hood. The cars cool steel was a god send when I turned my cheek to it. I was out like a light.
I remember coming back to consciousness in a haze. The world was spinning, even with my eyes shut. I felt the need to vomit again but knew it was futile because I had nothing left. In the distance, I still heard music and a tiny voice calling my name. unable to coax my eyes open, mostly out of fear of becoming more dizzy, I yelled a reply to Ford who was looking for me. He called my name again asking me where I was. Yelling as loud as my already throbbing head would allow I told him I was at the car. Still not knowing where he was and only vaguely aware of the general direction his voice was coming from, my friend came to reply that I was sleeping on someone else's car.

That was the last thing I remember. I woke up the next morning in my bunk with the most wicked hangover I've ever had. I swear that even my hair was in pain. There was no recollection of anything that happened from the time I realized I was passed out with my head on some strangers car. There was no recollection of getting to Fords ride (ironically a Mitsubishi by the way) or climbing the three flights of stairs at the barracks or stripping down and getting in my bed. I didn't move the rest of the day. I just laid in a semi fetal position trying to coax the ailing-creepy-slimy-rotten-dizzy-painful feeling to go away.

From then on it has been only beer.

Procrastination gene resurfaces.

Sorry for the lack of posts this week. It's been a relatively full one for me.

I've been:

...getting really drunk.

...playing poker.

...practicing this kind of stuff.

...and spending money I don't have on stuff I don't need.

Elaborations later.