General Black, I'm a Video Poker Man... not a Gigolo!

Day 4 - Part 1

Monday. Start of a new week. Change your luck, change your shirt, I always say. Or underpants. Or hotel. Or all three.

I fired up the Folio app thingy on the Luxor TV and confirmed that my hotel bill was indeed $0.00. They'd basically paid me $100 in waived resort fees to sleep for 6 hours with earplugs in a kind of crappy room, before moving to my decent Tower room. I'd do that all trip long. Hell, there were a lot of things I would do for $100 a night, including playing Parchesi with a man named Gunther, whilst singing selections from German operas such as Schumacher's Der Nürburgring, wearing lederhosen and a very sheer teddy - as long as nothing weird went on. Like, for example, if Gunther were ever to ask me to sing, say, Gilbert and Sullivan, I'd be screaming for a cop before he could blow the foam off another Weihenstephaner weissbier. I'm reminded of the great cold war era aviation films in which the likes of John Wayne no less let it be known that he wouldn't put up with that kind of hanky panky when there was a serious job at hand saying, "General Black, I'm a jet man!... not a gigolo."

Re-reading the above paragraph, it seems that I got off pretty lightly in what I had to do to earn the hundred.

It was good, all good, very good. I had lots of budget, I had a hot Poon Stang, and the Emergency Cheese, which I'd been keeping on ice, was in darn good shape.

That might even be a bit of ice in there with the Emergency Cheese.

I'd had a nibble or two of the cheese for a little cheesey pick-me-up (NO WHEY!) (WHEY.) and I hadn't seen colors yet or anything. Was today the day I needed to make breakfast out of it? I didn't think so - I should still have room on my resort credits. In fact, I had enough for the Pyramid Cafe again.

This is where I got into one of those stupid vacation walking look things. Once again, I head to the Pyramid Cafe, passing by the big line-up at Starbucker's. I feel briefly smug. Once again, it was closed until 7:00am. I traipsed over to Starbucker's for an Americano. Big line-up. Halfway through my wait the Barista Stupido announces that there is no hot water. And so no brewed coffee. (And no hot water for Americano either.)

No problem, I traipse across the width of the Luxor Pyramid to the other Starbucker's by the lobby. Even bigger line-up there. I get in. I wait. There is one person making drinks and one cleaning the tables. I finally get pissed off because the line isn't moving and traipse back to the first Starbucker's. The line there is even longer then it was. I think about traipsing yet again back to the other Starbucker's but sense that I might be caught in an espresso mousewheel. No, this is it. This is where I make my stand.

The Barista Stupido, five minutes after I rejoin the line, mentions again there is no hot water. The B.S. does not think to put up a fucking sign. But it's in my favor, as people leave the line to go to the lobby Starbucker's. I laugh at their misfortune.

Well, I stuck it out, and ordered a latte and one of their fake Egg McMuffin things. It's like an Egg McMuffin except that it has artisinal cheese. And a free cage egg. And glutimus maximums free buns. And kosher 3D printed ham. And it costs about $8.

Egg aMuffin with about $2.38 gone from it.

I'd brought the Bonebook with me and did a few updates for you in the north, hey you in the east, yo bro' in the west, and all y'all in the south, not to mention mes amis and my mates abroad.

Done with Starbuckers, I took a walk over to the security podium (where I'd found out the lost and found was).

"Do you have a kettle? I left one last time I was here."

"Was that recently?"

"No, that was like, a few months ago. I left a small kettle. Or maybe it was a coffee pot. Do you have either of those in lost and found?"

I was working the Security Sheila, finessing her a little bit.

"We only keep things for a month, then we donate them. Were you here a month ago or less? Didn't you ask me about this yesterday???"

Uh oh.

It was the same security guard I'd spoken too in the hallway outside my pyramid room.

"Ummm... well, no, that was some other complete fool. Good day to YOU, Security Sheila. Harumph!!!"

I got the hell out of there, red-faced, and without kettle.

Having eaten, embarrassed, surfed, updated, and coffeed, I ditched the computer back upstairs. I noticed there was a really cool seminar on and I was thinking about sitting in and learning a few things

After all, when MR Physics is in town, you'd better get off your frictionless surface, skip your soup de joule, and make your kinetic way to the show!!!

Although I was pretty excited at the prospect of learning more about spin echo imaging sequences and Partial Fourier and NEX imaging, I was really more into Relaxivity. I headed for the casino.

It did sadden me to think of all the fun that the MR Physics attendees were missing while I lost money at video poker. But not for long.

So where are the winning pictures this time??? Huh???? Nope. There aren't any.

The final tally at Luxor was 2400 hands of Jacks or Better with but one four of a kind. It was unreal. Bloody luck! Goddammit! Fucking RF excitation flip angle!!!! Shitty Ernst Angle!!!!

I should have had, according to Poindexter Statistical Law, 6 quads by now. I guess I was saving them for the Nugget.

It was a good thing I'd gotten up early again, because the registration for the Nugget tournament I was in was from 9:45am until 11:30 or something. I thought this was a bit odd because check-in is normally 3:00pm. Play in the tournament also started in the morning. It all didn't add up to me and I felt like I was missing something, but there was nothing else for it but to pack up all my stuff, do the zero dollar check-out, load up the Poon Stang, and head north, to downtown and the Golden Nugget.

On the way out, I left a Flusher card outside the West Tower Elevators.

---

As I dragged my shit out past the pool and to the self-parking lot (no fancy valet for Flushie, that might use up a much needed tip dollar!) I saw the signs of the impending doom of the Big Brother MGM Corp's much maligned assinine anti-customer cash grab fuck you parking fees - they were just turning on the big kiosks at which you'd have to pay to park and lose all your money to the whoring casinos. As if we didn't do that willingly enough already.

---

The $1K Scrounge Trip - June 2016: All Posts

Planning the $1K Scrounge Trip - June 2016

---

Like my page! It's all the rage!