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Tuesday, September 30, 2014

Smashed Burgers and el Big Guitars

Day 8 - Thursday July 24, 2014

Nice as the suite was, it was noisy in that part of Mandalay Bay - some of the same engineering geniuses that design the impossible-to-maintain grommet making equipment back home at Royal Canadian Veeblefetzer are the same overqualified twits that use their marginal industrial design savvy to create hotel room door auto-closers that manage to swing the doors at near the speed of sound, which results in a resounding explosion that echoes up and down the corridors, the likes of which have not been heard since the days of the great hydrogen-filled airships. And this every 38 seconds, for hours on end throughout the night. Oh, the humanity that operate the doors are partly to blame as well.
Are you here to see el Big Guitar?...
Fortunately, I had the ultimate antidote - squeezy ear plugs. They worked a treat and I slept like a baby until coffee time AM.

There’s a convenient little coffee bar right outside the elevators at Mandy B. No searching, no ice swans up Steve Wynn’s ass. Kenny would be in luxury coffee heaven before he even knew he wanted to be. I had to presume he knew about it, because I hadn’t actually laid eyes on him.

I went about my morning play, dropping a couple of hundred on short pay triple play Jacks with nothing to show for it at the end but a furrowed brow, Aces Kicker on Jacks for $32.50, three other quads which also got played back in, and deepening crease in my bankroll.




Kenny finally got in touch, and yes, he was game for breakfast, even though he’d had another bad night.

We met up and went for the buffet. I had all kinds of wonderful things. Fresh strawberries, omelette with peppers, mushrooms, jalapenos and a good portion of cheese to Zamboni the cholesterol out of my arteries. I had a happy little mini country fried steak, breakfast taters, sausage, and a good dipping from the vat o’ country throw-up gravy poured over the whole mess, strawberries and all. C.T.U.G. is like WD-40 - there ain’t nothing that it don’t work on!


Meanwhile, Kenny had a healthy breakfast of sugar, sugar, dextrose, fructose, glucose, and comatose. I’m talking a couple of donuts, heaps of fruit, some sort of pastry thing, coffee with four or five packets in.

I had to step in.

“Kenny, pal, you really need to round out your diet a little. All that sugar you eat… it can’t be good for you.!”

“Royal, you’re right,” said Kenny, and ambled off to the buffet. He returned forthwith bearing a plate with three rashers of bacon on it, of which he ate exactly one.

“That’s better, bro’” I said. “So, what to do next?”

What indeed?! Well, ablutions, it turned out. We went our own way to go shower and shave and whatnot, with the plan that we’d meet up in an hour or so.

And we did, and then went to the car, which was a very pleasurable experience because for once, we didn’t lose the fucking thing in yet another never-ending Vegas strip parkade.

No, like capable adults, we got off on the correct floor, and actually managed to walk straight to the rental.

I wished someone would award us a gold star and say, “What a GOOD. JOB. you did boys! Well DONNNNNNE!”

First up, we wanted to check out Guitar Center. We drove south, eyeballing various interesting looking businesses.

“Texas de Brazil. What’s that?” asked Kenny.

“Churra… churra scaria?” I said, reading aloud.

“Brazilian Steak House,” said Kenny. “There’s absolutely no hair on the steak. They remove it tableside with a wax strip.”

I found the Guitar Center and we went in. I had a good time looking at the stuff but Kenny was zoning out. I’d go somewhere, he’d follow. I’d look at something, he’d follow. I asked him if he wanted to check out the keyboards and he said, no, not really. What was going on with the guy?
A beautiful wall of guitars.
What's worse than an unaffordable $8000 Tele?
...An unaffordable $35,000 Strat.
Instead of the $35,000 Strat, I bought a couple of t-shirts and we headed over to Fry’s which I was sure Kenny would love. But it was the same deal, I was kind of enthused about seeing stuff but Kenny was just along for the ride. I picked up a bunch of on-sale crap, including some cheap replacement Apple knock-off cables. $10 each. The Apple ones were $23. I bought two.

We got back in the car and I suggested about the most fun thing two guys who have been cut loose in Vegas could possibly think to do.

“Let’s get some dirty, greasy, disgusting food and go and sit by the airport and eat lunch and watch planes!” I said.

But you know what? Kenny just wanted to go back to the hotel. As in now. Right fucking now.

“I can barely stay away, I’m seeing shadows, I feel weak, I’m short of breath. I just want to go back to bed.”

I exited the big-ass car mall and did a U-turn on LVB, and headed back up to Mandalay B. Whereupon I dropped poor Kenny off at the main porte cochon.

“Take care, okay? Text or call if you need anything.”

He was gone.

I decided to make the best of it, and drove south again, looking for a likely burger joint to try. I pulled into a place called Smashburger and ordered some greasy, disgusting, dirty, greasy food.

The cheeseburger was hot and dripping with grease which ran all over my fingers. Dirty, greasy grease. It was fucking great. The fries were fresh but super super salty, so I didn’t eat many of those. I had some kind of dirty, greasy diet root beer or something to wash down the dirty, greasy lunch. Big success!


I headed back to the Bay and valet parked this time.

I did some play and I noticed that I was continually getting 'kicker' hands on Jacks. It was frustrating even though had I been playing Double Double, I wouldn't have gotten those hands because I would be playing a different game, different timing, different parallel universe, etc. etc.

Still.




I took a long break in the suite and watched some more of Ramsay yelling at people. Hung around. Watched the planes. Pondered my terrible luck.

After a few hours, I was at that point where I was down another couple of hundred on the day, and sick of losing, and it was time to go at it again.

I prepared another one of my high-end $2.50 cigars, nestling it like its brother, with all the care it deserved, in my shirt pocket.

The elevator spit me out and as I walked by the little lobby store and into the casino I heard a live voice singing… Luck Be a Lady! It sounded just like Frank Sinatra but it wasn’t.

It was Fake Sinatra.

A Sinatra tribute guy sings live to drums and keyboard in the lounge (the same one that does double duty as the True Luxury - not fake ice swan - Coffee Dispensary).
Fake Sinatra at Mandalay Bay - Loved it!
With Fake Sinatra crooning, whiskey coming, and a terrible stogie going, I felt great and thought ‘I’ll just take it easy, play low volatility. Preserve my bankroll.’

Unfortunately, my brain re-arranged the letters in preserve my bankroll to ‘perverse my bankroll’ and I found myself playing high volatility Double Double Bonus.

Okay, at least it was quarters. Single line only.

The first twenty went.

The second twenty… heavens to Betsy and Murgatroyd… I was dealt this for $200.


Finally, some luck! The Sinatra music had done it! Thank you, old closed-eyes!!!

I cashed out $180 and got a ping from Kenny, asking if I’d eaten dinner yet. I sent a Tex back saying I hadn’t. I decided to head back over to the machines near where Fake Sinatra was singing so it would be easy for him to find me.

I played there for a while and kept checking for Texes. Meanwhile, I played a twenty in the triple play and went on one of those great runs where you just keep winning all the time. I rang it up to about $50 and then down and out, but had a great time with my cocktails, cigar, and Fakey. I was dealt three Aces two or three times and dealt three of a kind about eight times but never got a quad.

One thing I saw was a couple of women playing some machines, drinking and smoking, with their bundle in a stroller, pretty much ignored, behind them. I was pretty disgusted by this behavior until I got a glimpse of the ugliest baby I’d ever seen.

The baby had to weigh about two pounds, had a wet nose, poor kid, pointy ears like you’ve never seen, and fur all over its naked body.Thank goodness, it was just a Chihuahua.

By now about an hour and a half had passed since I had heard from Kenny so I thought the hell with it, I might as well go and eat.

I hit this little Mexican food place in the mall called Hussong’s Cantina, and it was great.

They had a band playing and they even had one of those big guitars. I call this rare instrument by it's proper name, el Big Guitar. It is not easy to play el Big Guitar, let alone find one for purchase in the Big Guitar Center for $35,000.


They brought chips and two kinds of salsa and didn’t try to upsell me on no eight fucking dollar bean dip, thank you very much.

In honor of el Big Guitar I ordered what turned out to be el Big Burrito. This thing was about the size of a football and kind of rudely shaped, which pleased me no end. It was good and very filling. For the last third I scooped out the prizes inside and ate that part, leaving behind about a half pound of tortilla.

Sadly, I’d only caught the last half of the last song of el Big Guitar Band. But I will definitely return to Hussong’s again, at more timely hours, to enjoy some el Big Guitar Music and a burrito the size of Gary Busey’s head.

The bill was about $24 including tip, and worth it.
Hussong's Cantina Royal Flusher Restaurant Rating - three and a half to a Royal.
Feeling satisfied (but slightly worried about Absent Kenny) I thought, I’ll just meander through the casino, feel good, stay calm, go to my room, take in the sights, not take any chances. Play it smart. Play it safe. Enjoy sitting on a win for a change.

Then I thought, maybe a gambling nightcap. One twenty and that’s it.

“Just one twenty,” I muttered aloud, then making a slashing motion across my throat, “and that’s it. One twenty. And that’s it.”

I went back to my favorite triple play machines and slipped a lucky twenty in, and pulled up Double Double. These are the ones that are pretty much in sight of a bank of ATMs. Not far from the high limit room. I played about ten hands or so and holy crap, four Aces for $200. No kicker, but hey, I’ll take it.

And I cashed it out. I went up to the suite with tickets in my wallet for $380. I’d started with a $500 bankroll, so I was out $120. And one Kenny.

What a difference though! Instead of being down $500 I was down only $120 based on just two hands. If I’d gotten the kicker on the Aces, I’d have had a winning day.

But I’ll take what I can get. And tomorrow was another day.

Royal Flusher: Day: $-120 Trip: $-2910





    1 comment:

    1. Ummmm....me thinks it's time to pack Kenny up and place him on a plane. ANY plane to any place. He's stifling and not very good company at that.

      ReplyDelete

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