Friday, January 5, 2018

Good morning crew,

Weeks before our New Year's Eve casino excursion about 8 people had expressed interest in going with, but one-by-one and two-by-two they had begged off and dropped out until by the 31st it was down to the wife and me.

We both took this as a bad sign. Sitting around the kitchen that morning we were on the verge of talking ourselves out of going at all, but then we determined, what were we going to do with the money? Save it? Invest it? Spend it on a fulfilling life? Not likely. So we went anyway.

Sauntering up to the casino bar just around noon the wife and I ordered ourselves a breakfast beer and I took a look at the games. Every casino has video games right in the bar top (why waste the space?) so I fed a 20 into the game right in front of me and selected video poker.

Wonder of wonders, in the first couple of spins I hit a four-of-a-kind. That's 200 bucks! And I had barely taken the first sip of my breakfast beer.

For a few delusional moments I thought about cashing out and just hanging out at the bar while the wife tested her luck on the slot machines, but that idea faded like a mirage and ten minutes later I was following her around with my winnings in a loose, accessible roll in my front pocket.

I shouldn't have to tell you that we both lost pretty much the rest of the day. Oh, we won back just enough to keep us going. We actually spent over four hours there, slowly losing, but eventually we ended up back at the bar, poorer but no wiser.

As we were leaving we walked past the roulette game and I caught the wife's elbow.

Pulling out a hundred I told her, "I held this back just in case both of us lost we would still be able to go out to dinner tonight, but if you feel like one more gamble we can dump this on the roulette table and see if we can double it."

She agreed, a little more willingly than I thought she might considering the beating she just took, but then again it was my money we were gambling with.

So I asked her, "Red or black?"

She studied the board carefully for a few moments and finally said, "Black. Definitely black."

So I took my single, lonely $100 chip and put it down on red.

I have to admit, I turned my back while the wheel was spinning. All we had at home was canned tuna and Triscuits, and I wasn't looking forward to that as my New Year's Eve meal. But after a few seconds I heard that tell-tale 'plunk, plunk, plunk' as the marble settled into its slot and the wife screamed. It was red.

As happy as she was, the wife was still a little annoyed with me that I made it a point to ask her how she wanted to bet and then did the exact opposite.

"I'm sorry Hon, but you've been losing all day," I explained to her, "and you should always play the trends."

Laugh it up,

Joe

joe@gophercentral.com

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"A company is working on a new selfie stick shaped like a human arm so users won't look like they're alone in pictures. Instead you'll just look like a completely normal person who's carrying around a severed human arm." -Seth Meyers

***
"A new report says that dogs can sniff out prostate cancer with almost 98 percent accuracy. The report also finds that cats can sniff it out with 100 percent accuracy but they prefer to watch you die." -Conan O'Brien

***
"A new survey found that a growing number of millennials want to work from home and get more time off. They would have said more, but they had to pick up their gold star for participating in that survey." -Jimmy Fallon

***
After a long day of shopping, my daughter and I stopped at a grocery store. I ran in to pick up a few things, leaving her in the car. As I approached the checkout I was surprised to see my daughter there waiting for me.

"Honey," I said, "what are you doing in here? I left the motor running."

"It's all right, Mom," she replied reassuringly. "I locked the doors."




*-------------- Guaranteed to Roll Your Eyes --------------*
My girlfriend isn't the brightest bulb. One day when she was being particularly dimwitted, I said in frustration, "What's your IQ anyway?!"

She shot back defiantly, "20/20!"