I finished up and started mentally saying goodbye to Vegas, and getting my mind back on things at home.
Took one last look at the Air FU Canada website and... the leg from Toronto to Flusherville Regional Aerodrome on the AeroCrashSpatiale Beechditch 6900 Whimperfan engined Turbodump (model 'D') was cancelled. The Vegas to Toronto flight wasn't cancelled but the second leg was. Hmmm....
I clicked on the rebooking tool and... it let me go in and pick a new set of flights. For Wednesday. I immediately got on the blower to Mrs. Flusher. Would she be mad? Happy?
She actually suggested Thursday would be a safer, better bet.
Click, click, click and I was in. Booked for Thursday, leaving at noon.
I felt an incredible rush. Reprieve! Exhaltation! Joy! Holy crap, three more nights in Vegas, no more redeye, win, win, win! Quickly booked a room offer at
See, in Vegas, Money talks and Bullshit walks through the casino with a laptop under one arm or stays at Crap-scaldmyballs-ibur.
I felt like a drink, hit the bar, and promptly got quad 2s for $100. Holy crap, life can be good sometimes.
Decided to have a decent dinner and revisited the quiet Pasta Pirate. The hostess still can not tell me what the connection between pasta or Italian food in general and pirates is. I ordered up, the pasta special of the day which was a fresh, grilled chicken breast tossed with leftover grilled sausage slices and penne pasta. It was pretty good.
I spied three pretty nice looking ladies at the table next to mine with pretty high Island Senior Girlfriend (I.S.G.). They were having crab legs and I asked how it was. Apparently, pretty good. And I remarked that the crab had a lot of legs, because there was a plate of empties stacked about 8" high.
I think this is probably the way to get a feed of decent crab, forget about buffet crab.
If you are going to get crabs, the Pasta Pirate is a sure bet.
We chatted a bit more and I got back to my meal. After a while the waitress came over and told me that another table was going to send dessert over to me.
Yes, the three lovely I.S.G.'s sent cheesecake to my table.
Honestly, I was touched. And it all started to come clear about why I had needed to come to Vegas and what I was looking for (beyond pounding the cracked greasy video poker buttons, drinking to excess, and generally having a blast).
I was looking for something or someone to help me up a bit after I'd gotten so rundown. But I found that the more I gave to others in the little contacts we had, whether strangers or new found friends, the more things seemed to come back, and the more life looked a bit rosier.
It's giving, right? Its those 'kindness of stranger' moments, whether its mercilessly pointing out that someone forgot to get a scratchcard so they don't forget again, or running after a gentleman who left $20 behind in the TITO machine (this happened, I never bothered to write it up), or whether its helping a far-east funky le freak team get into their room for a gassy three-way session, or whether its just saying hello to the Keno guy when you see him away from the Keno lounge.
Those things make you feel better about yourself. And they have a strange karmic way of enhancing your life, in this case, in the guise of free cheesecake.
I told the lovely I.S.G.s about my circumstances and a bit about myself and we had a few laughs. They each got a patented Royal Flusher business card, and I truly hope they will read about this and be glad I didn't give them each a cheesecakey kiss on the cheek - cause I wanted to.
Lately I think I am becoming more and more Hawaiian. Eating their food, playing shoulder to shoulder with them. I like it. And as I was trying to explain to these folks how their gesture had touched me, I talked about how I liked the Cal so much because there was long lost friends greeting each other, families holidaying together, even nephews dealing blackjack to aunts... I struggled with my words and one of them helped me out.
"Aloha spirit," she said.
Yes, that's what it is, Aloha spirit.
From now on, the number 50 is in my go-to Keno numbers, for the 50th state, Hawaii.
However... if I don't freaking get a Royal Flusher or Aces with Kicker tomorrow, I'm moving out of here in a heartbeat and going somewhere lucky.
Today by the numbers, not much change. I broke even on VP.
VP: day 0 trip (-1350)
BJ: day 0 trip +380
Craps: day 0 trip +615
Total: day 0 trip -255
Another quad I got along the way. |
A pretty sweet DDB hit to get me even on the day. |