It's Not Over Until Keno Says It Is

When is a finished Vegas trip not finished? When there's still action! White hot 5 cent a game live Keno action at the D!

It really was a fine trip, nice and long, with some really lucky wins happening in week 2. I thought back fondly on getting the Loose Doose twice in 10 minutes, including on the redeal, on the Quad Queen's royal flush, and hitting the Shockwave quad for $1000, and on getting some ridiculously unearned out-of-the-blue video keno hits.

Stashed away in the back of my memory place, tucked between the memory place storage of things I forgot to buy at Costco even though I went to Costco specifically for those things, and the memory place storage of 69 cent a litre gasoline I bought once, was the fact that I had a Keno ticket.

A beautiful, 500 game, Candyman keno ticket that was so far unchecked.

And as long as I didn't check it, in my happy hopes place (just down the aisle from the potholed memory place) I could think that yes, it probably was a big winner!

I let this go on for that whole first week back, savoring the thought of that keno ticket, letting the Candyman sweeten my thoughts like a slowly dissolving brain peppermint. (My happy hopes place also harbored the distant thought that at some point I might become a competent writer, that I might write similes as beauty as corn paper atmospheric.)

Well all that fancy wordshit is well and good - but I know you want to know what I wanted to know, and right now, dammit, how much did that $75 keno ticket pay back??!!!!

I really kind of hated to call, because even though I was shlepping through work days, I was sort of still on the Vegas trip.

Of course, finally, I gave in, like a virgin simile, giving in to a champion metaphor's advances.

So how do you check a keno ticket at a distance? It's actually very easy. You find an 800 number for the casino, and you call it.

As soon as someone answers, you just repeat, "KENO DESK KENO DESK KENO DESK!" until they either transfer you to someone else, in which case you shout, "KENO DESK KENO DESK KENO DESK KENO DESK", or maybe, you get the Keno desk.

At that point, the Keno Sheila answers and you say, "Uhh... I wanna.... uhh... checkuh tickit?"

Every keno ticket has some sort of identification number on it and in the case of the D, it's labeled as a 'serial number'.

So, I simply provided the magic serial number to the Keno Sheila and waited...

And I got the last set of tingly winglies of the trip - that little bit of suspension, the chasm where time stops and you hang between what could be, and what you fear will be.

Should I hope? It's probably nothing. I might win big, then I can go back to Vegas and blow it all! I only bet 15 cents a game, and keno sucks, it's probably nothing. I might have won on multiple games! It's probably nothing. ANYTHING can happen! Nothing's gonna happen.

And then... and then... and THEN...





... along came Jones.

Sorry.

And then... "Seven dollars and seventy cents."

I could barely contain my non-existent fake excitement. A 10.26% return on my $75 investment

"Thanks for the life-changing news, Keno Sheila."

She chuckled. "You're welcome. Thanks for playing at the D."

And then the trip was really, truly and finally done.

I don't have another trip planned. Nope.

And it's killing me!

I'm like... I've been good, I've worked hard slaving for the Man at Royal Canadian Veeblefetzer, it's been such a longggg time since I was in Vegas, I'm justified in poking around at offers and airfares, right? And I have a stake when I get there - $7.70 to win a fortune with, right?

Then I realize it's been 3 weeks and 5 days since we returned home.

It's no longer Shut Up and Deal, it's Shut Up and Work.

How long can I last?

You'll be the first to know.