Royal Moose

Thursday Feb 23, 2023 part 1 and I'd had a great night's sleep at Wynn. Earplugs. Great bed. Winning day under our belts.

Quite often I do sleep with earplugs in to have a restful sleep, particularly when downtown. The other night when putting them in I dropped one and couldn't find it, and I had only half a good night.

Having coffee in the room, I remembered that I had an uncashed $6 TITO from the Cal. And I had to return the car at noon to the Mirage.

And so... I hatched a master plan - a mission! With a bunch of things to do. I did some research on those special phrases you can use at the D to get match plays, and headed down to the car.

I pulled out of Wynn at 8:21 am, heading north on the Strip, and parked at Cal at 8:32. Fuckin' beautiful.

Because our stay at the Cal officially ended at checkout time this day, my Aloha coupons were still good, and of course, I took advantage of them for breakfast.

I ordered my usual two over hard with sausage, hash browns, and wheat toast. 

I suppose I could post the same photo of breakfast over and over each day, so you can get the idea.

Another $17 comp thanks to the Aloha coupon. Woohoo!

That done, I had a mission within my mission, and whipped up to the Parlor Suite to take care of it. And sure enough, the garbage in the hall was still there, evidenced by the rather obvious orange peel we'd walked by about 19 times in the last 4 days.

So! Downstairs again, and I cashed out the $6 ticket and headed to the Plaza for a little shot at my lucky CRT machine from the day before. I risked $20 in it. And it ate my $20.

This is where one day a bar will be!

Funny how, in Vegas, I can feel chuffed and chest-puffed for half a day about a $17 breakfast comp, and then throw away $20 in a machine in under a minute without batting an eye.

Which reminds, me, we have earplugs, why don't we have eyeplugs?

It was freezing out. Just freezing. Like not much above freezing freezing. I casino hopped to stay warm, skirting through the Golden Gate, then into the Golden Nugget, zipping across the street and into the Four Queens, down the steps and out, and across in front of the band stand and into the D.

I uttered a couple of magic phrases at the slot club desk and scored two $25 match plays. Why haven't I been doing this every trip??!! (Some of them are one time only deals, some are not.)

Upstairs I cashed in a Keno ticket and won "No Win". Bully for me.

I was made for this.

I decided to play blackjack with my match plays.

While waiting for the shoe to finish prior to buying in, I witnessed what I thought was the most interesting and exciting hand of blackjack I would ever see. I was wrong about that, but we'll circle back later.

I was standing in an empty spot waiting to buy in and the guy to my left, who looked a little like Norm on Cheers, was spreading $75 to $125 a hand. Like all of us, he wins a few and loses a few.

Norm pushes out a bet of $150. The cards come and he's got a pair of eights on the felt against the dealer's ten up card.

Norm knows what he's doing and splits the eights into two hands. One hand gets a ten for 18 and the other... gets another eight. Hmmm, that's interesting.

Norm splits those eights and is dealt a ten on one hand and a three on the other. He's sitting on two hands of 18 and one of 11, trying to decide whether to double or not.

He thinks for a long, long time - he's got $450 on the table right now, a lot compared to his typical bet - and finally pushes out another $150, which is most of his stack.

The card comes and it's... a six. He's got two hands of 18 and one of 17 and is in for $600.

The dealer turns over his hole card and shows a 4, for a total of 14.

He pulls another card and flips it over.

An 8. A beautiful 8, and the dealer busts with 22. The table erupts, everyone cheering for Norm, who has sweat bullets down his pants and into his socks.

Nicely done, Norm!

I played a couple of $10 hands and won enough to cover the first of my two $25 match plays. And I was dealt a blackjack. Great!

I played a bit more, trying to pick my spot, and finally pushed the second $25 match play out along with $25 of my own.

The dealer turned over an Ace. I never take insurance but too late I think about inquiring about taking insurance on a match play. Maybe I should have taken it to save the chip.

Anyway, the dealer had 21 so I lost that hand. But I did color with $75 in profit.

This stage of the mission was a success, and I felt like I was in complete control. I pimp walked over to Fremont, to Lanai Express, the next objective.

My plan is to use another Aloha coupon to pick up some Chinese food and later, heat it up for dinner in my five star room at the Wynn like some luxury refugee.

It was about 10:30 in the morning. Lanai Express opens at 11:00. I'm in a casino on Fremont Street and I have to kill 30 minutes. What to do to pass the time? Hmmm, let me see.

Well of course, I'll just dabble around on Super Slutty Slippery Shitty Shafty Shucking Shunting Shooting Sucking Times Pay.

I put in Five Dollars. Five Whole Dollars. I lost it.

I took a deep breath, staying calm submissive, sitting nicely.

Then I inserted Ten Dollars. Ten Whole Dollars. I lost that too.

Ah, then I saw the problem - I was on five play, and not triple play. I changed games and primed the pump with Twenty Dollars. Twenty Whole Dollars.

It took twice as long as ten dollars and four times as long as five dollars for me to hit Credit 0.

Hmmm.

I checked my wrist chronometer and found that it was now 10:34 am. I had successfully killed 4 minutes until the Slop Wok Bar opened.

I inserted One Hundred Dollars. I was in complete control. And now I had a decent stake.

Nothing much happened for a while and I'd played down to about $50 when I was dealt one of those hands that can potentially make a difference.

I had a 5x multiplier, and three sevens dealt. I Facetimed the Quad Queen so she could enjoy the fireworks from a distance. But of course it sputtered. No quad. Bugger.

I did get one little ole quad and by the time Lanai Express Slop Factory Wok Bar was open I'd managed to salvage $105 out of my total of $135 buy in and cashed out. I considered not going broke on this machine a win of sorts.

I got the 2 item combo at Lanai Express with my Aloha coupon book, scoring my second free meal in a couple of hours, all of the steam table slop factory fresh to boot.

Two free meals in an hour and a half. But the Lanai Express stuff is for supper, not to be eaten now. 

I drove back to Wynn, beeping through the stations trying to find something interesting. I ended up grooving to a great show on 88.1 FM with a genuine, real DJ. A DJ that match the beats as one song transitioned to another. The aural menu was old soul classics and I loved it.

Check out DJ Benzo on KCEP Power 88.1 https://www.power88lv.com/radio-schedule

The sun was out, I was about even on the day, the music was vibing, and the car smelled like shitty Chinese take-out. What more could a poor boy want?