An old friend of mine who lives in Denver has been feeling low with a
run of personal bad luck, so I bought her a plane ticket so she could
meet me in Reno for a little R&R.
Dianne said, "I don't have any money so I can't gamble." I
said, "I'll bankroll you on the condition that you do everything I
tell you and that you give up your winnings to me. In exchange, I'll
cover all your expenses this weekend." She said that sounded like a
good deal, and not to worry, because although she is personally
unlucky, she is very lucky for other people. I said, yeah, whatever,
and figured I'd invest a couple hundred in her just so we could have
some fun.
My friend is just beginning to learn poker, so at least she had
gotten the four suits and the basic hand rankings down. Whew. I was
worried I would have to start at absolute square one.
A few weeks before our trip, I bought her a set of strategy cards and
pointed her to http://www.freeslots.com so she could practice on
FPDW. Although the strategy cards were heiroglyphics at first, she
at least developed an intuitive sense of correct play after awhile.
Much to her credit, she practiced diligently.
We got into the airport about the same time Thursday night. It was
cold and there was snow on the ground. She looked at me: "I left
Denver for THIS?" She had never been to Reno before and her first
impression was not good. At least she was jazzed when we checked in
as VIPs at the Silver Legacy. "Hey, this is nice!"
We decided to take the gambling REAL slow, and each started off with
the $15 in promotional chips for $10 buy-in. I settled on a $5 pai
gow poker game as the best way to play really slowly and get cocktail
service. We each put $5 in promotional chips in the betting circle
and proceeded to sit there and sit there and sit there. There was no
losing. A LOT of pushing, some winning, but those $5 in promotional
chips kept working for us. Every other hand my friend had the joker,
which slowed the game down even more as we would discuss the hand
with the dealer and chat with the other players. Everyone was having
a fine time just taking it easy. After two hours, my friend said she
was tired and could we quit? This was new to me. Quit while you
still have all your promotional chips? Oh yeah, I guess they'll be
good tomorrow. That must have jinxed us because then we immediately
lost our initial $5. So we picked up the rest of our promotional
chips plus our tidy profit to end the day up $55. Not bad.
Friday we had massages scheduled for 3 in the afternoon. We slept
in, wasted a lot of time gabbing, and then just barely had time for
lunch before we got our massages. By the way, Dianne recommends Jack
at the Silver Legacy for a good deep tissue sports massage.
All rubbed down and feeling relaxed, Dianne was finally ready to try
some video poker. I warned her: "Sometimes I go ALL weekend without
hitting quad deuces." Dianne nodded sagely. I gave her $100 to put
in the machine and I think she nearly fainted as she watched the
credits dwindle down to $70 as she played. She played VERY slowly,
and asked me for advice on every hand. As a consequence, I had to
play slowly too, but we were having fun. About 15 minutes into it,
she hit a wild royal. She was delighted and confessed her concern
that she was going to blow the whole $100. I told her not to worry.
About 15 minutes later, she asked, "I just hold the 2 twos, right?"
I cringed at "twos" and thought, "We need to work on lingo." Then I
thought, "You know, she's going to get the quad deuces." Sure
enough, the other "2 twos" popped up. I hugged her gleefully and
Dianne gave me a confused look. "That's worth $250!" I exclaimed.
She beamed. "I want to quit!" She pushed the cash out button for a
profit of $245. "I've paid for our massages, haven't I?" She was
delighted.
Although Dianne was finished, she said she was happy to watch me
play. "Okay by me." We chatted while I played, and wouldn't you
know it, 15 minutes later I got quad deuces too. Most excellent. A
great ending to a good day.
Saturday I had scheduled our massages at the Siena. Since our
massages weren't until 4pm, Dianne slept in while I played a couple
hours of $1 10-7 DB progressive. I hit aces and a small quads and
managed a win of $950. I woke up Dianne and told her we were well on
our way to paying for everything, so long as our luck held.
It was snowing hard. "I've never seen it like this. Ever." I don't
think Dianne believed me. There were no taxis to be had, but
thankfully, my friend had on sensible Denver clothing and we headed
out into the snow. We weren't going to let a snowstorm get inbetween
us and a massage. Again, there was the reproachful look, "We're
going to Vegas next time, right?" (Ironically, I heard it snowed in
Las Vegas at the same time.)
The massages at the Siena were blissful. Dianne and I can heartily
recommend Julie (90-minute Swedish) and Gwyn (90-minute hot stone).
As my friend Dianne said, "That was worth a walk through a driving
snowstorm." Thank goodness they had fruit in the waiting room
because neither Dianne nor I had had anything to eat. We had been
too busy having fun!
The wonderful folks at the spa hooked us up with one of the bellmen
who gave us a ride to Harrah's in his 4-wheel drive, so at least we
didn't have to walk back through the snow. As we touched down at
Harrah's, Dianne smiled and said, "I like Reno!"
I got us free tickets to see "Wonderland" at Harrah's, and for free,
it was definitely worth it. It even came with two drinks. We also
had an excellent dinner at Cafe Andreotti.
I checked out the sports bar at Harrah's and was disappointed to see
that the 10-7 DB had been downgraded to 9-7. The bastards. I
probably would have lost a ton of money anyway.
Feeling pleasantly lubricated, we managed the short distance back to
the Silver Legacy where Dianne declared herself ready for more video
poker. "I don't know," I said, "I'm really sleepy." Dianne had had
the benefit of sleeping in until 2:30pm, so she was raring to go. I
didn't take too much convincing. So back over to the FPDW machines
we went.
Again, we were playing VERY slowly, as Dianne consulted her handy-
dandy Bob Dancer strategy card and then asked me for confirmation on
every hand. I tried to let her think out the correct play each
time. I really was tired, and was doing my best not to get confused
on my own machine. After 10 minutes of play, I got dealt Ah Kh 7h Th
Qh. "Hey, look at this," I said to Dianne. I discarded the 7h and
up came the Jh. I was ecstatic. Dianne was confused, but smart
enough to figure out that the happy music was a good thing. We
hugged. We laughed. We maybe even cried a little. (I've gotten 4
royals in around 2 years of serious play. Three of those royals have
been in hearts.)
The slot attendant came to pay me. She counted out ten $100 bills in
my hand while Dianne took a picture. Then the slot attendant counted
out an eleventh $100 bill. Now it was my turn to be confused. Oh my
god, the progressive was $1139 not $1039. I hadn't even noticed. I
told you I was tired.
I agreed with Dianne that it was time to celebrate and maybe even PAY
for a drink. We cashed out and headed to Rum Bullions to make a
toast to new beginnings in 2005. As we lifted our glasses, Dianne
reminded me, "I told you I was lucky for other people!" I agreed
wholeheartedly and said it was high time that she was lucky for
herself.
As she left, Dianne said, "I love Reno!" I just hoped the whole
experience wouldn't turn her into a gambling degenerate. She assured
me, though, that she almost had a heart attack when she was down all
of $30 at video poker. She had fun with me, but gambling was not her
cup of tea. Just 15 minutes in front of a machine was exhausting to
her, so it's good we got lucky in a hurry. (We played so little
video poker, I was worried that I had hosed my daily average.)
After Dianne left Sunday morning, I headed back to the FPDW machines
in an attempt to repair my daily average. I proceeded to blow $450.
My luck had indeed left. Even so, that wasn't enough to wipe out all
the previous good fortune. I still went home with a profit of
$2100. A most excellent weekend and maybe I now have a new video
poker partner.