Flusherville, We Have a Problem. And Lunch.

I radioed Capcom that I had heard an explosion in my wallet. Accordingly, Capcom put out an A.P.B. (All Poon Bulletin) on luck. Last seen yesterday.

Today is Thursday, and I'm writing this on Thursday, and that can't be good news, now can it.

This has been a fairly reasonable trip so far, although video poker has been below average, I would say. The largest win I've had on the trip was the $350 some whatever on Buffalo at the Plaza, and three or four $200 ones.

The Quad Queen and I have a rough historical average figure in mind for what we are typically going to lose per person and I've been about $10 under that so far.

No longer.

The morning dawned hot and ready, like one of those mugshot schoolteachers in the news.
The morning dawned bright and ready, like one of those pencil sharpening accountants at the IRS.

I'm in a groove now, and it's great. Get up, fire up the Little Giant, get writing, drink coffee, make punishment breakfast, write as brilliantly as I can in the minimum amount of time, which means basically stooping to churn out a bunch of hackneyed half-formed ideas substituting for hand-crafted smashing prose.

I wanted to pick up where I left off last night, gambling-wise. I've been road testing a new video keno concoction where I take five numbers and bet on every four-spot possible (five of them). Think of it this way. I leave one number out and pick the other four. Then on another card, I leave the next number out and pick the other four. On top of that, I bet all five numbers on one card.

And, since I've been knocking out five out of fives like speeding tickets on the last day of the month this trip, I've been adding a second card with the five out of five, just like Max at the California taught me. So if I hit five, I'm in the money, baby.

The total bet is 7 quarters. Hitting any two numbers returns 6 quarters. Any three or more is a winner. Hit four numbers and it's about 34 bucks.

But the one I want is the all-you-can-eat five out of five, paying $170 for the five four out of fours, and about $420 for the two five out of fives. Grand total around six bills.

Well, it won't happen. I've lost it, if I ever had it.

First thing this morning, I played some video poker on a progressive, where the royal was up over $2,000. I managed to get one quad but about $65 disappeared in short order.

After that, I had a dip into the video keno lake with just a twenty. It went away. So I put in $100 and actually got a fair amount of play off of it.

The fours kept hitting to keep me in it, as planned. In fact, they hit about ten times. I stopped taking photos because silly. From $100 I slowly dropped to $25, then recovered up to $120, but then variance slo-mo kicked me in the keno balls, and that was that. I'd played about an hour and a half, but was still down almost $200 for the day.

Time to regroup and do some monkeying around. I had originally booked two nights at Wynn using gems from the Wynn Slots app, and booked Main Street Station for the next night. It turned out that I did get the third night at Wynn - which was double booked with MSS. But I kept the MSS reservation, intending to wallow in the $20 food and $10 freeplay..

So, I grabbed the car keys, and found the car, started it, and began the hot, tiresome, road journey to Tacos El Gordo, some 650 meters from the Wynn parking structure. Because lunch. Because tacos, baby.

I'm new to hand-held cuisine featuring staple grains and corn geometrically symetrically aligned in a two dimensional structure of deliciousness, and inter-dimensionally warped (or bent) so as to hold, for the eating, and a filling that will make your mouth scream for mother's hot fucking mercy, it tastes so good.

So, I ordered four al pastor tacos.

Al Pastor hard at work on my tacos.

This was my first foray into the 'al pastor' style of taco, having only just this week been set straight that al pastor is not a religious figure, but a cone of mouth-watering meaty, spicy, flavor chunks that, as far as your tastebuds go, defy fucking gravity.

Holy shit were they good! Al, you've got it going on, bitch. Mugs up for Al Pastor! Hip Hip el Hooray!

Seriously, I'm already craving more, and tomorrow, come what may, I'm going to down about 9 of the things.

Stuffed full of meat and spice and smoke and tortilla and onion and cilantro and green stuff, I wheeled onward, downtown, and valet parked at Main Street Station, where, in a display of Vegas hotel civilization, they don't charge for such service, so you can happily tip the hard working fried as an egg in 109F heat valet guy or valet girl. (OK, fine. For sure, for sure, Frank.)

I checked in to MSS, got my key, and used the room. Then I visited the slot club booth where the stupid computer told the boothling that I was also present for the slot tournament, which starts tomorrow, and for which I have a reservation at the Cal. Because 'the system' let me book it, I say. Don't blame me!!!!

As predicted, the sun worshiping scene at the Cal pool is fucked, Circa about now.

She warned me not to use my slot play, because to do so would cause double dipping and I might be kicked out of the tournament. I promised I wouldn't, and volunteered that I wouldn't use the $20 in food either.

I'm skating on thin ice and I hope my zeal about receiving food and freeplay doesn't cause mission control to abort the slot tournament rendezvous. As if this wasn't bad enough, the boothling got on the phone to somebody. And muttered in quiet tones, while occasionally looking askance at me.

I think I'm busted for booking back to back. BUT THE SYSTEM! IT LET ME!

We'll see. The events which followed should make Main Street beg to have me stay and play in the their casino environs.

I made my way back to the casino and played:
- Loose Doose
- Bonus Poker
- Treasure Chest
- Double Double Super Slutty Times Pay Al Pastor
- Buffalo
- Aces No Faces Coin Dropper De Luxe
- Video McKeno
- Boner Deluxe

And the piece de resistance:
- triple play Bonus Poker

I received no jackpots, no wins, no quads, no scratch cards, sweet fuck video poker all.

Oh My Gawd it was bad.

I checked at the kiosk and it said I had two buffets coming. I punched the screen for one of the buffets and it printed a ticket. Apparently, if you earn 15 tier points in a day (on certain days, Mon-Thu?) you get a breakfast or lunch buffet.

My ticket said it expired at 3:00pm. It was 2:05pm and I was full of tacos.

What to do? EAT FREE FOOD. That's what.

So, on other days, like, say, Tuesdays, you can use these buffet dealies the next day. But I think they don't run this promo on Fridays or the weekend, so if you earn it on a Thursday, you have to use it on a Thursday, but never on a Sunday, a Sunday, a Sunday, 'cause that's my day of rest.

(If some parts of my writing makes some sort of wry sense and raises an eyebrow and a knowing smile, good for you, you get the cultural reference. If it makes you go wonky cross-eyed and wonder if I've lost my shit, google it. It'll come clear, and you'll know that much more useless trivia. Tell 'em Connie Francis sent you.)

So anyway, I confirmed that had it been yesterday, I could have eaten today, but since it was today, and Thursday, I had to eat in the next 45 minutes. I got seated and filled a plate with spinach salad, goober, prizes, disks, has-beens, and prairie dog dressing, a couple of fried poochies, some farty-boys, some Andromeda Strain goop, pre-grilled cheese tufts, pickle-disks, and spicy nicies.

And I ate that shit up like a solitary confinement Sunday Dinner. (Never mind that I said never.)

After that, I went to the cage and took a marker. And I continued to lose very quickly at everything I tried.

The Quad Queen and I also contend that one day on a trip will be your 'bad day' where you will lose four times what you are used to. Today is that day.

After getting my ass kicked at both Main Street and the Cal, I retrieved the rental from MSS valet and motored back to Wynn. Whereupon I lost an additional hundred on video keno, hitting no day-saving five out of fives to speak of.

I did manage this glimmer of hope, which was quickly extinguished, like one of my first dates.

This meant confinement to The Room. Going through dirty clothes and repacking them for easy transit home. Making drinks. Watching news TV. Making drinks. Eating chips. Whining to home.

And, in the end, sitting and watching the sun set and the lights of the strip come on, which was actually pretty enjoyable for something that's free.

So where are we? My luck, such as it was, has fled me. Over seven days of casino-brand gambling, I've netted 15 quads and one straight flush. If you know me, this is shameful, in the pathetic video poker performance loser sense.

Today alone, I lost as much as I have total on the trip thus far, on the previous days.

So here I sit, getting smashed on cheap bourbon, still gazing out upon the incredible beauty and conflux of the Fabulous Strip and the distant desert mountains, and writing up this post.

Here's the A.P.B. (All Poon Bulletin) on luck.

If you confess and think and ponder, if you light incense, if you have a curling guru, if you have George Michaels faith, if you pray like there is no tomorrow for sinners and lost souls, whores and gamblers, if you try to believe a train is comin', if you drop to your ankles to give thanks and ask forgiveness for trying to scam the casino, if you care about your fellow man, or space man as it were, if you understand that the E Plebnista rules, if you have ever asked whatever is outside of you and up there and out there for holy shit a bit of luck - touch your talismans, beads, and flaming feathers, and win one for Gipper Royal Flusher.

I'm pulling in all the mojo I've got working tonight.

I'm giving it all I've got.

I've got 6,000 Wynn points I can convert into $60 of play. Mrs. Flusher has some 4,000 points that she doesn't know about that I can convert into some $40 of play.

And if you've shown your support to the blog in the PayPal sense... and indicated that your love gift should be used in only the most desperate and degenerate of situations, for a long shot, for a last chance, for a high volatility, punishment cheese desperation gamble - this is it that time, this is when I'm calling in that marker.

Tonight.

Tonight, I'm pulling out your generous support like a you-know-what out of a fly and putting $100 of it on the line onto something ridiculously stupid and volatile, per gambling norms and conventions.

I thank you for your support, and for your thoughts, and holy shit, where's the tylenol.

Let's see what happens!!!!

Flusher doesn't go down without a fight.

I got this for Jimmy Poon.

This is legit what my call display said at one point. Well, duh!