Hi Gang:
Hedy and I spent last weekend at Harrah's AC and we are happy to report that
both the Diamond Lounge and Seven Stars Lounge are still going strong with
no change of food offerings or hours. Everyone connected with Harrah's that we
speak with assures us that they've heard nothing about any closures or
changes of hours and seems genuinely shocked when the possibility of the Seven
Stars Lounge closing is brought up.
Gambling-wise, our 2008 surge continued but it took another miracle royal
late Saturday night to pull us out of a hole.
Things started well on Friday as Hedy went on another 50-cent DBDJ binge
where she seemed to be hitting the same bonus quad over and over. This time it
was treys. On this day, she hit quad treys SIX times for $200 each and chipped
in with aces for $400 and fours for another $200. During the afternoon, we
drove over to Borgata to eat lunch in the Amphora Lounge (fabulous food and
ambiance still, by the way) and collect some cash back. We got stuck a couple of
hundred early on, but Hedy again bailed us out when she hit quad fours on
STP with a 3X multiplier for $300. My contribution for the day was a SF for
$250 while playing $1 9/6 JOB at Harrah's.
Saturday we picked up our Dirt Devil vacuum at Harrah's (after cutting a
two-hour line thanks to our Seven Stars card), but our VP adventures went into a
deep freeze as $100 bills started to disappear at an alarming rate. By the
time we settled in to play some 9/6 JOB at around 6 that night, all our profit
from the day before had gone South and we were getting dangerously close to
the $2,000 loss mark for the trip.
Then, something miraculous happened. I was playing $1 9/6 JOB on the second
machine from the left at the bank near the Xhibition bar/cash center when I
realized that this session was going nowhere. The original $200 I put into the
machine was down to $30, so I decided to switch denominations to 50-cents.
The machine perked up almost immediately, giving me back-to-back boats and a
couple of flushes and I felt like maybe, just maybe, things were turning
around.
I was right ... I just didn't know to what extent!!
After finishing a hand, I hit the draw button and, suddenly, my machine
locked up, music started to play and I was staring at the A-J-10-K-Q of diamonds
on my screen with the word "held" sitting above all five cards. The, finally,
it sunk in! I had been DEALT a royal!!! For $2,000!!!
I jumped up and yelled to Hedy (playing to my right), "I got dealt a royal
... yesss!!"
We started to celebrate almost immediately, took our obligatory photo (we
have a picture of all 170 royals we've hit in our career) and began chatting
with a couple playing to Hedy's right. It turns out they are also on the AC list
and VPFree and, believe it or not, live on Staten Island as well. Their
names were Bob and Ronnie, and Bob said he mostly lurks on both boards. His
sign-on is Runner Bob. They're very nice folks and we hit it off immediately, even
sharing a meal with them and two of their friends in the Seven Stars Lounge
a bit later.
The royal was my fifth dealt one (believe it or not, Hedy still has only
one) and was our fifth at Harrah's this calendar year, three of them W2G's. This
is certainly making up for our miserable 2007 at Harrah's, where we took our
lumps, going the entire year with only four royals, one for Hedy, which she
hit on Dec. 30.
We'll be taking this weekend off because of a family party on Saturday but
we'll be back at it the weekend of the 25th and 26th, again staying at
Harrah's. We're hoping the royal rampage continues!
Regards,
CoachVee (Tom V) & Hedy
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