Lube and Bones

Needless to say, I was pretty pleased about hitting a Royal Flush. I had a prime seat to watch the goings on out on Fremont Street, sang along quietly with American Pie, saw Michael Jackson playing video poker at the bar a few seats down from me, and occasionally, glanced down at my beautiful diamond royal.

I'd held two cards and on the draw recognized right away what it was. It was a surprise, it's pretty hard to get a royal from two. And at this point in the trip, I'd had 4 unsuccessful draws from four to a royal.

I cashed out my ticket, took some pics for the blog, and drank my drink, and reveled in the amazement of it all. This is one of the finest moments of a trip for me, especially considering it has been a full year since I've had a royal.

Trying not to feel invincible, I bought in for $60 at the craps table and ordered another drink. Before the drink came, my buy-in was gone. Brutal.

I was at sort of a tipping point. I wanted to book a thousand dollar win on the day, and I was trying not to get carried away. The smart thing to do would be to call it a night. I was tired. I'd got the royal. I knew not to chase when I didn't need to.

So, I bought in for another hundred.

A few of us around the end of a table got talking, including an attractive woman who, when queried, mentioned that she was in town for a conference.

"The waste disposal conference?" I asked.

"That's right."

She had that sort of hot librarian look going on with some sort of designer glasses. To me, this means glasses whose frames are a color, not black or silver or gold.

I'd met a woman on the flight out who was with Petro-Canada - she was portfolio manager or some darn thing for some of the products they sell that heavy vehicles use.

"I sat next to an interesting woman on the plane who is also attending the same conference - maybe you've bumped into her."

"What does she do?"

I smiled and said, "She's into grease, gels, and lubricants."

I have to admit, I felt a small thrill when the hot librarian craps shooting woman blushed. I decided to really cement our new friendship.

"Did you know there are over 352 variants of heavy truck lubricants?"

She looked down at the felt and unnecessarily sorted her chips, which were all of the same denomination. I could tell we were really making a connection.

The fellow next to me was killing himself and jumped in with "So how many of these 352 do you know?"

The next thing that happened was my shining moment in this conversation. I thought for about the length of time it takes for a size 7 grommet to fall from the veeblefetzer pounder to the hopper, and replied.

"Two of them - with... and without."

At this point I was down about $80 on my total $160 buy-in. The next shooter got on a heater. And it was goooood.

He was hitting points, hitting hardways like nobody's business, and I made money like everyone else did. It was the kind of roll that when it was done, everyone claps, and colors up immediately, scattering from the table like flies shooed out of the kitchen.

I cashed out $190, a profit of $30 on the session.

What a great day. Everything went my way, and I was up $1151 on the trip. I hadn't even touched the day's budget and won $1171 on the day. Now that is some kick-ass Royal Flusher Vegas Revenge!