37. With Mom, Boppa, Dana, Sue, and Chris Tadd - Fitzgeralds, December 22-24, 1992

• Boppa played the exact same slot machine as last trip, and won $250.00 again.

36. With Boppa and Mike Stefanidis - The Four Queens, September 18-20, 1992

• Mike and I got hammered. That's all that need be said about that.

• Boppa hit a $250.00 slot jackpot by lining up three 7s on the bottom line of a machine at a 97.4% payback carousel. It kept him up for the rest of the trip.

• Mike and I were playing craps at the Four Queens, and a new shooter had just established a point. All the players made their additional bets; I think Mike and I were out there pretty heavily with place bets. Then the stickman pushed the dice to the shooter, and the guy who had previously been shooting picked up the dice and shot them instead! As the dice were in the air, many of the players (including Mike) were yelling, "Wrong shooter! Wrong shooter!" Well, sure enough, he rolled a seven. The dealers started to collect the bets, but the players protested. "That was the wrong shooter!" The dealer on our side of the table was saying that it didn't matter who shot the dice. Finally a pit boss came over, assessed the situation, and told the dealers to ignore the roll and let the real shooter continue. Pretty amazing. Then the real shooter rolled two or three numbers and sevened out himself.

35. With Mike Stefanidis - August 30, 1992

• Vegas insanity reached its zenith with this trip. At 2:30 in the afternoon, Mike and I decided to fly to Las Vegas on the next available flight, and fly home on the last flight out that night. We ended up being in Vegas for a total of two hours. And we lost.

34. With Mike Stefanidis - The Dunes, August 15-16, 1992

• Since the guy who was supposed to paint Mike's house didn't show on Saturday, we decided to go to Vegas. We got a flight leaving at 3:30 p.m.

• We had a real hard time getting a room; almost everywhere we went, we caught the pit's attention with the amount of money we were playing with, and you could tell they were more than willing to give us a comped room, but they just didn't have any. Finally, at about 2:00 a.m., the pit at the Dunes said they had a room for us. This after I had gone up to the check-in window and had been told that "the Queen of England couldn't get a room here tonight."

• The pit at the Imperial Palace apologized that they were out of rooms and offered us a free meal at their top-of-the-line steak restaurant. Total comped meal for the two of us: $66.00.

• Well, I learned this trip that I've got to change the way I play craps. Mike and I played at the same tables the whole trip; he won a little bit, I lost a ton.

33. With Mike Stefanidis - Fitzgeralds, August 1-2, 1992

• Mike and I decided to break my new car in, so on Saturday (August 1) we called a VIP number for Fitzgeralds (which had been given to us by a pit boss) and made reservations for that night. Then, at about 10:30 p.m., we hit the road.

• It was a dismal, dismal trip. We exclusively played craps, and never got on a really hot roll.

• While we were waiting to get a cash advance at Caesars, Jay Leno stepped up to the cashier's window next to us. All sorts of people were coming up to him, shaking his hand, asking for photographs. We asked him if that kind of thing got to him, you know, always getting hounded in public. With a smile on his face he said, "Well, it pays the bills."

• Mike was having a decent roll at The Mirage. At one point he rolled his point of five, and it turned out that a high roller at the other end of the table had made a hop bet on the five for about $20.00. Mike's next roll was another five to establish a new point, and the guy had left his hop bet out there, so he won again. He pressed it up to about $40.00 and said to Mike, "If you roll it again, you get half." Well, sure enough, Mike rolled another five. He looked down at the guy as if to say, "Hey, you said half," and the guy immediately said, "Give him half!" It was a great moment, plus by rolling the five he made his point, so everyone won.

32. With Mike Stefanidis and Paul Huyser - The Four Queens, July 18-19, 1992

• As soon as we arrived at McCarran Airport, we stopped by the rest room, and afterwards as we were walking out to the taxis, we noticed that Paul's shirt was sticking out of his unzipped fly.

• Paul and Mike both won, Paul playing blackjack, Mike playing craps. I lost, which was frustrating because I played at all the tables with Mike. The dice were just falling right for the way he was playing, and not right for me.

• We ate lunch at the Four Queens coffee shop, and Mike's keno luck continued. He filled out a $5.00 20-spot ticket, just like trip 29 (although not the same numbers), and this time none of his numbers came up. He won $500.00.^*

• We stopped by the Glitter Gulch for a few drinks.

• When Mike and I were playing at The Mirage, an older guy with a huge wad of hundred dollar bills stepped up to the table. He threw down some bills, and the dealer picked them up. They were new and crisp, so the dealer said, "Did you just print these?"

  Now, that's a pretty common joke; we've all heard it, and many of us have said it. There really is nothing at all offensive about it; it's just a silly joke. Well, this high roller got furious. He started ranting and raving, cussing at the pit boss, complaining about the dealer and his joke. A real jerk. After he left, I heard the pit mention that he was a big player who was a friend of Steve Wynn's (then the owner of The Mirage).

  Of course the dealer didn't get in any kind of trouble; it was just a harmless comment. I suggested to the dealer that maybe the guy got upset because he really did just print up the bills.

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^*In some casinos, it would have paid $1,000.00.

31. Alone on an "up and back" junket - July 11, 1992

• Not quite as good this time; I lost $89.00 ($140.25 after expenses).

30. Alone on an "up and back" junket - July 3, 1992

• This was my first try at counting cards at blackjack, and it was quite successful; I won about $240.00 ($180.00 after expenses).

• I only got "heat" at one casino, the Golden Gate, where they shuffled up on me whenever I increased my bet. Ironically, the first time they shuffled up on me, I was dealt a blackjack! (I had left my increased bet out there, so as not to call more attention to myself.)

29. With Mike Stefanidis - The Four Queens, May 30-31, 1992

• We played craps almost exclusively, 'cause, you know, we did so well last trip. Well, neither one of us did well this time; in fact, Mike got hammered, losing upwards of $2,000.00.

• One bright moment for Mike: We ate lunch at The Four Queens coffee shop, and he played a 20-spot keno ticket for $5.00. Eleven of his numbers came up, so he won $200.00.

• Clayton and Ron were in Vegas for an art convention, so we met them for dinner at the Las Vegas Hilton on Saturday night.

• Mike and I were playing at Caesars Palace, and I turned to him and mentioned that the guy throwing the dice looked like Burl Ives. A couple of people around us heard what I said and started to laugh. Well, the guy got on a really hot roll, and eventually we all started cheering, "Come on, Burl! Roll numbers, Burl!" Finally after he hit a point of ten, I turned to everybody and sang, "Silver and gold, silver and gold!"

28. With Mike Stefanidis - Primadonna, May 2-3, 1992

• On Saturday afternoon (May 2) Mike and I decided we wanted to drive to Vegas that night. However, we had already been given some free field-level tickets to the Padre game, so we wouldn't be able to leave until the game was over. We figured we'd leave for Vegas at about 11:00 p.m., get there at about 4:00 a.m., play all day, and then leave for home at about 6:00 p.m., although we weren't sure what we were going to do about sleep.

  The Padre game ended fairly early; I drove home to change and then met Mike at his house. We did in fact leave right at 11:00, and I suggested that we each try to sleep some in the car. Well, of course that didn't work. Then by about the time we got to Barstow, Mike suggested that we stop and sleep at Whiskey Pete's for about five hours, then head on to Vegas. So, that's what we did, although we actually stayed at the hotel across from Whiskey Pete's, Primadonna (now Primm Valley). We checked in at about 3:00 a.m. and slept till 8:30 a.m. Good thing, too, because otherwise we would have been exhausted by Sunday night.

• Actually, we didn't sleep all the way through, because at 6:30 a.m., the hotel fire alarm went off. It was a terrible piercing noise that actually hurt our ears. We started to get dressed, but after about five minutes it stopped. We never did find out why it went off.

• We played craps almost exclusively the whole time we were there (until about 7:00 p.m.). Mike and I won over $1,000.00 between us, thanks in a large part to buying the ten; it was incredible how many times it hit.

27. With Mike Stefanidis, Paul Huyser, and Stan Wong - The Four Queens, April 10-12, 1992

• We all took advantage of a Four Queens junket. We each paid $189.00 in San Diego, which got us round-trip plane flights and hotel rooms for two nights. Then after we'd played eight hours at The Four Queens, they gave us each $100.00 cash and $100.00 in goofy chips.^* We were all really happy with the conditions of the junket.

• By Saturday night, Mike, was down quite a bit: close to $1,200.00. On Sunday morning he had an incredible craps hand at The Four Queens which won him back about $600.00, and later that afternoon he bet like a maniac on blackjack at Silver City and won the rest back. He ended up ahead for the trip about $35.00.

• Getting back to Mike's great craps hand. He made a total of six points, which is, although not extraordinary, pretty impressive. But the thing that did make it extraordinary was that five of those six points were fours or tens. Anyone pressing his line bet and taking full odds was making good money.

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^*They’re really called match-play chips, and they can be wagered on an even money bet (like in blackjack). For every real chip you bet, you can bet one match play chip of the same value. If you win, the dealer takes your match play chip and replaces it with a real one (and of course pays off your real chip). If you lose, he just takes both your real chip and match play chip. So, assuming you win half of your bets, your $100.00 in match play chips should translate to $50.00 in real money.

26. With Mike Stefanidis - The Sahara, January 17-19, 1992

• Mike and I left Friday night on a whim, and what a roller-coaster ride of a trip. By Sunday morning we were each up over $1,000.00, and by Sunday afternoon we had lost it all back. Kind of pathetic, really.