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Tuesday, October 10, 2017

Go Big or Go Home

Go Big or Go Home
My wife has a friend who only gets in touch when she wins at the casino. 
“Won $6000 today!”
Or when she gets free stuff.
“Free dinner and a show last week, COMPED AGAIN!”
She only plays expensive machines, and always the maximum.
“Go big or go home!”
She never loses and always gets free stuff.
She lives in a crappy home mortgaged to the hilt, drives a crappy car, works sporadically and her husband is on disability (but not really disabled).
She never loses, but she is a loser.
I’ve noticed this about many gamblers, they never lose, and yet they are big losers in life. 
I remember a lady at work whose life was the AC casinos and Church run bingo.
“How did you do at AC this weekend?”
“I won $1500.”
“Wow!  That’s great,”
“Then I lost $1900…I probably should have quit, but the room was free and we were comped for dinner.”
At least she was honest, but to me her room and dinner cost $400.
Gambling is infectious, you know the odds are against you, and yet gamblers keep betting, hoping for that big adrenaline boosting win.
Mrs. C and I hit the casino every now and then.  We are not gamblers.  I know that because we never win, real gamblers always claim to win.  We play penny slots, and at .20 a bet, I can breeze through $20 in about ten minutes.  That is why we both have a $40 limit.  We always lose, but then we don’t have a system.
Gamblers, the ones who never lose, always have a system. 
“Wait for a machine that has been cold, the odds will catch up, and skip to a new machine if you are not hitting.”
Great advise, except odds are odds…they do not change on a machine.  It’s like flipping a penny and waiting for a penny that is due to come up heads, or changing to a new penny if you keep losing flips.  Penny is a penny, a machine is a machine, odds are odds.
Anyway;  Mrs. C and I are not gamblers as we bet small, quit when we lose our allotted funds, and we never win.  We go small, but own our home.
Actually, we did win once, or Mrs. C did.
Mrs. C played a penny machine for hours and only lost about $15…she was hot.  I hit big on video poker and was only down $8.
“OK, let’s go while we are up.”  (Well down $23, but up because we had not lost our allotted $80.)”
“Wait, I’ve earned $10 in casino money.”
“Great, take it and let’s go.”
“You can’t just take it, you have to bet it.  I’m going to bet on the dollar machine, I’ve always wanted to try one.”
Mrs. C took her $10 credit and put it in the dollar machine, she then bet the max…$5 and hit spin.
“Crap, that’s $5!”  My head spun, I could not imagine betting that much on a single spin.
“Relax, it’s casino money, and you know what they say,  Go big or go home.”
She lost the $5, then won $8, then lost $3.
“You bet the $10, cash out the $5 that is left and let’s go.”
“One more spin.”
Understand the only thing we knew about this machine was whether you won or lost, what fruit alignment payed off, we had no idea.
The machine spun our last $5 and a whole lot of similar fruit lined up in several ways.
“That has to be good.”
Bells rang, lights blinked and numbers kept running up.  It seemed to last for about 5 minutes.  When it was done she had a credit of $475!
“Holy crap! You hit big on the last spin.”
“Wait, let’s just play until we get to $1000 or $400, whatever comes first.”
I pushed the cash out button, grabbed the $475 ticket and hollered,
“Bull shit, start the car, we are outta here.”
For the one and only time, we went big and went home.

18 comments:

  1. I'm not a gambler either. I take $200 (birthday money.) If I win, great. If I don't. Oh well. Win or lose, I always have gas money to get home and a buck 99 for the Denny's grand slam breakfast. :) - My sister is very lucky and wins big. She won $10k at one machine and after the men and black showed up and did their thing, some kid that was sweeping floors told her to go over and play the Wheel of Fortune machine. She did and won an additional $1,200. He got a great tip that night.

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  2. I've never gambled (well, not inb a casino, although one might say I'm gambling every time I drive in Houston).

    My grandparents used to. My grandmother said they never gambled to win, but rather to have fun.

    With as many addictions as I already have, I'd probably be better off starting heroin rather than waiting for that big $475 payoff.

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  3. I don't generally gamble with money. I used to play Bingo with a friend. I never won, she ALWAYS did. I cannot explain it.

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  4. Good for you! That's what I would have done. I've been to the casino here in Adelaide only once, bet my $40, won $100 and quit while I was ahead.
    My ex#1 would have kept betting and not come home until his pockets were empty. He did once win big and came home very late, woke me up and showered the bed with money saying that was my share.

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  5. Good plan...cash out and run. Occasionally we buy a lottery ticket $5 plus $1 encore. Once in a while we win a free ticket.

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  6. You were oh so lucky to win and leave with winnings. The second part is wisdom.

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  7. I’m not a gambler either. Have played the slots a few times but no really big wins. A couple who are friends of mine aren’t gamblers either, but the wife seems to be lucky. Most times when they’ve played slots she ends up winning enough, even a little more, to cover their expenses.

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    1. I know a few people like this myself...I suspect they stretch the truth from time to time. It is virtually impossible to cover expenses and a little more all the time. What they really mean (in my opinion) is they only spent and or lost what ever limit they set themselves. These people are not losers like the GBOGH people.

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  8. I will only play the slot machines that are in the most traffic areas of the casino in Vegas My theory is they want people to witness winning machines to encourage playing. However, I've never been up more than about $15.

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  9. I'm not a gambler either. If the odds were in your favor, there wouldn't be as many large, very nice casinos. Once, when I was 16, I went to the dog races in Mexico. (If you're old enough to reach the betting window, you're old enough to gamble in Mexico.) Long story short, my 2 dogs came in first and second, and the results board blinked and read there was a $25,000 payout on this race. Holy crap, I thought. I just won $25,000! I sprinted to the payout window, only to find about 500 other people ahead of me. I didn't realize we all had to split that $25K. *sigh* So much for my BIG win.

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  10. I know this gal. Yep.

    We don't gamble. We have a nice home and I drive a new car. I'm not a loser, but I've seen people act just like this.

    Have a fabulous day, Joe. ☺

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  11. I bet once, in Reno. Walked into a grocery store, and there was an overlooked quarter in the slot machine coin up. I played it, and won four quarters. I played and lost them, one at a time. I went grocery shopping and left.

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  12. Not a big gambler here. Last time in a casino, I played my $5.00 limit in the penny slots and left with $6.25. About enough winnings for a bottle of water. I do play the local Ar. Lottery weekly, only because I use the same numbers and know the day I don't, they will come in. I'm trapped.

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  13. Sweetie and i don't go to the casino. The one time we did, like you, we set a small limit and when we lost it we left.

    The Big Boss is wealthy, everything he has is paid for, and he goes to the casinos and comes out with thousands of dollars every single time. It's truly astounding.

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  14. My dad was a gambling man so we often took weekend drives to Las Vegas. (He never bet grocery or rent money & couldn't understand people who did. He also had a problem with people who complained about losing. He felt that you willingly paid money to see a movie or a play or when you rent something & that gambling was essentially no different.)

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  15. Let the record show that the crappy home my nonworking husband and I live in is completely paid for, and so are the crappy car and the crappy garage we park it in!

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  16. Good decision, Joe. I know because I've NOT done that.

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  17. I don't gamble much, either. But the last time I was in Vegas (in 1989), I gambled and won big. I married my husband.

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