This is a post I've been meaning to do for some time. Every once in a while, one of our esteemed authors writes an article (or a book) about the issues I've outlined below; for example, Bob Dancer had a very interesting and useful article in which he discussed how he deals with the volumes of monthly mail and does his scheduling on a big calendar. Are all of these issues addressed in one place? I haven't read Jean's books yet, so I apologize if they are covered there. If not, perhaps these are good ideas for one (or more) new chapter(s). 
In my particular case, these questions are aimed at playing as a local in Las Vegas; however, many of the same issues apply (possibly to lesser degrees) in other locations or situations, such as someone who plays only in Atlantic City or someone who plays multiple casinos in multiple locations. Heavy play isn't always required, either; some of these things apply even to limited play at various places.
Here goes:
1. What to do with all the slot club cards! How do I keep them organized?
I keep mine in a large organizer with credit card slots in it that the Palms gave away some time ago. However, the little leather strips are falling apart, and when it gets hot the glue became gooey and messy. How does everyone store and organize them, if you have one for almost every casino in Vegas as I do? And I only keep the most-used ones in the organizer; the seldom-used ones are in a different hanging-pouch-thingy (also a casino freebie) in my car.
2. How do I deal with all the cash I need to play, as well as winnings, and avoid going to the bank all the time?
I saw very little about this until a recent Strictly Slots article. Going to the bank all the time and then carrying alot of cash around becomes a pain, if not outright dangerous. When I used to fly in for the occasional weekend, I would either carry cash or travelers checks, or a combination thereof. Casinos wouldn't take cashiers checks or bank checks, so I started doing travelers checks. But the max denomination was $100, so if you wanted to bring 10k you had to sign 100 travelers checks! And it doesn't take a super-high-limit player to need 5k or 10k. Establishing credit lines at various casinos helped IMMENSELY on this subject. It also means you can use the OPM principle (Other People's Money) - use it carefully, of course. Some mention of "Front Money" would be good too - I've used it to deposit big cash winnings so I don't have to carry it around at night, etc. And also worth mentioning is that you can request a check for your winnings. I'm sure some of this is
covered elsewhere, but perhaps not all of it. I've had to learn it sort of on my own, bit by bit.
3. How do I handle all the mail?
As the mail comes in, I first keep it sorted by month. For the current (or upcoming) month, I sort it into 2 piles by date order: one pile is just for events that involve a hotel stay (such as tournaments, fights, concerts etc), the other pile is for bounce-back or special events occuring on a certain day, such as a promotion or drawing. That seems to work well for me, since I need a place to stay. Other locals probably don't need the separation, but either way the piles can become huge and unwieldy. I keep them bound in large rubber bands; sometimes I crop the unnecessary extra stuff from the important part of the mailer. I'm curious how other locals deal with the volume of mail. Thanks again to Bob for addressing this in his previous article, as well as the next question.
4. How do I schedule all of the play I want or need to do?
I use a little mini-calendar to track events I'm interested in or have already booked; that's worked out ok for me. But there's also a day-by-day issue for locals; you have to be organized or you will forget to pick up some bounceback [I just did this yesterday 
it happens far too often!]. Perhaps a Day Planner or PDA is needed to really stay on top of things. And with gas prices these days, you also have to think about the ORDER in which you do things; you don't want to criss-cross back and forth across town for 20 bucks here and $10 there - you'll end up spending more in gas than you collect!
5. How do I keep track of my play, coin-in, etc for taxes and other analysis?
I keep a little cheap notebook, like the ones we used to use in school for our homework. But this is a manual method and not very useful; if you want to do any analysis on it, such as for year-end taxes or just to know how you're doing at a particular casino, you have to re-enter the data into a spreadsheet , database, or some other piece of software. I'm leaning towards purchasing a PDA that will accomodate this (as well as the planning issue in the previous question), such as a Pocket PC (which means you can also run WinPoker on it!
I'm sure there are other issues, but those are the main ones I can think of at the moment. I'm interested to hear any feedback on this that anyone cares to offer, as well as any other issues and how you handle them.
Thanks,
John
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