The T.I. Hustle

I saw Shin Lim a couple of times on Penn and Teller's Fool Us show (he fooled 'em twice) and said to myself, "Self, I'd actually pay to see a guy who can do what he can do."

Even better, the guy putting on the show in Vegas that can do what he can do was Shin Lim himself, not some other guy doing what Shin Lim can do. I'd bought tickets and tonight was the night of the show.

Day 6 part 3

It was a good time for taking photos so I took some of buildings. The buildings had lights on them so I took their photo. I've taken photos of these same buildings 9,000 times.

But lights, though!

The Plaza building, with the Garage Mahal in its nascent form rising like another building in the night.

The California building, with the nascent Circa blah blah etc. etc.

The Main Street Station building, doing 75 miles an hour.

Our ride plopped us down in the main entrance to T.I. and in we went.

I have so many great memories from this place, going back about twenty years now, I guess. This was the place we'd first learned how to work the system to get comps.


We played dollar coin dropper Bonus Poker at a buck a throw. We'd take turns. After each win, we'd cash out the coins and stack them on the machines. These machines paid the right amount for a Royal no matter how many coins you played.

Somehow, there was a glitch in the system and we were rated as dollar slot players. I think now, because we played so slowly, they might have been looking partly at time on the machine.

Every day we'd get a meal or two at the coffee shop - two rounds of drinks, appetizer, main, and dessert. And we'd get cash back too. It was nothing short of great.

It was on those machines that I got my first dollar and only dealt Royal ever. And I happened to bet $5 that hand too, instead of the usual $1. Winning $4000 was pretty heady for a guy with an $80 a day budget.

We had a pretty solid timeline figured out. Shin Lim started at 7:30 so we figured we'd eat at 6:00 and get to Mirage for a little after 7:00.

There was no line at the coffee shop, and we had some time to kill before 6:00, so we hit the bar for a few drinks.


It was really nice sitting and playing and enjoying Maker's and Jameson respectively. Unfortunately, we got our asses simply reamed at the video poker.

I was surprised and pleased to see that the video keno paytables weren't horrible (five out of five paid 810 and six out of six 1600) so I switched to that.

Hey barkeep, my light is on. Bring it!

And that didn't go well, so I switched to Triple Double Bonus.

My oh my, I was dealt three Aces and a Deuce. All I needed was that fourth Pointy for a cool $1000.

Fucking 5 of Hearts.

Fuck you, five of hearts!!!

I am so disappointed by my complete inability to get kickers, to draw kickers from holding four cards, to get a royal flush from four cards.

I SUCK at it. It's been a couple of years of near constant disappointment drawing those cards.

NO KICKER FOR YOU.

At about 6:00, we hit the head, buckled our swashes, and headed for the coffee shop.

Lineup.

Out of nowhere, a huge lineup. We got into line and after five minutes, the guy said it would be 20 to 25 minutes.

"It can't possibly be 20 to 25 minutes," I said. "Look at all the empty tables."

"Those tables have no servers, probably," replied the Quad Queen.

She was right.

After 20 to 25 minutes we were near the front of the line. Then some VIP guy showed up and waltzed to the front just as I have done with such pleasure at times in the past when I had status or a VIP this or that.

By the time we were seated it was 6:37. Timestamp.

We both knew already what we were going to order, and when the waitress finally appeared, I explained the situation. She took our order and we would have to hope for the best, I guess.

After a couple of minutes, she dropped by and told us that she'd put our order in ahead of all her other customers (hopefully including VIP jerk). Awesome!

And when the food arrived at 6:47 (along with the check!), I grabbed a picture and dug in. Kung Pao Chicken for me, burger and fries for the lady.

The Coffee Shop at T.I. has a solid Chinese / Vietnamese menu section.

We ate as quick as we could and were out of there by 7:07 PM and hustling to Mirage, to the Ferry Tator Theatre, way, way in back.

They'd made it clear on the ticket - Shin Lim would start on time and there was no opening Lim. I mean act.

Time to hustle!