My wife and I had dinner and did a little gambling in Sarnia again
Saturday. Had a great meal at Sicily, an upscale Italian restaurant,
next to the casino. Good prices, good atmosphere, and good food.
Saturday nights are not my favorite times to visit casinos because
of how crowded the places usually are. In a small casino like
Hiawatha, it's difficult to find an open video poker or let alone a
slot machine, but after a short wait, I was able to get on a quarter
Game Maker that had Pick'Em. I inserted a hundred, and started
playing.
Right away I had trouble concentrating and started making a few
mistakes. The reason was that on the drive over from the states, I
discovered that I had left my birth certificate in my other car and
was worried about getting back into the country.
This happened to my sister once at the Windsor Tunnel and the
guards there were insisting that her husband drive all the way home
and back (at least a three hour trip) to get her birth certificate
while she waited at the border. I thought this was a little extreme
as my sister is an elderly woman with health problems and could
hardly be considered a threat to the country.
Luckily, they had a relative who was one of the border guards
there and when they mentioned his name they were allowed to leave.
So here I am playing Pick'Em at Hiawatha and trying to concentrate
and make all the correct decisions, but in the back of my mind, I
kept wondering if I was going to have problems at the border on the
way back.
This is where all those hundreds of hours spent practicing on Win
Poker and Frugal Poker paid off. Even though my mind was wandering, I
guess I was still instinctively making the correct decisions because
I eventually hit one $150 quad on the quarter machine, and two $600
quads on the dollar ones. I eventually took home about $700 American.
Later on the way back at the border, we approached the border with
some trepidation, but the guard hardly paid much
attention to us and after a few simple questions, let us back into
the good old USA. Whew! I was relieved.
The lesson being that, although I was lucky, if you have to play
games that require a lot of concentration, like video poker, don't
play if you are under stress or having problems thinking straight.
It's not much fun and you will probably lose.
Good Luck to all. Terry Murphy & VP Pappy
"A wallet, like a parachute, should not be opened in the volitile
atmosphere of a casino unless you have a pretty good idea of what
your chances are of success."
--VP Pappy