Vegas trip report: A "Rhapsody" in six or seven parts

[IronDragon1]

Part 1-"The God of Gamblers"

Despite what some would think given my cyberspace gambling history-I have never lost control of myself when I gamble with tangible money-chips count as money for these purposes. Maybe it’s a natural shyness or just that I’m able to control my degenerative tendencies when I can see what’s at stake but in all the previous times I have played –EV (table) games I have been able to control myself so that I never bet more than 2 times the table minimum-never betting more than $50 a hand. This has served me well so far as I’ve never done more than lose my miscellaneous (tips, food, transportation, etc.) expenses on gambling expeditions and have actually come up a net winner on several occasions, including my last trip to Vegas in January.

And so, with perfect faith in my ability to maintain a decent sized bet relative to my bankroll-10K-and control myself I immediately grabbed a cab to Wynn after settling in at the Luxor. First target was a blackjack table where I sit down with $2500 and immediately get served with “more 12s and 13s than R.Kelly” as Bill Simmons would put it and soon find myself upping my bet of 2 spots @ $25 a hand to $100 a spot. Down to my last $500 of this particular segment of my bankroll I mount an epic comeback and finish up $25 (maybe $75 minus tips) and am starting to feel invincible-which is obviously just the worst thing which could happen to me. I pull similar shenanigans at Pai Gow (poker), this time betting $200 a hand and coming back from $2200 down.

The rest of the evening consists of me playing cheap ass ($25 or $50) Pai Gow at various MGM owned casinos. As I should’ve figured would happen, my standard operating procedure of just sitting and betting small doesn’t really do it for me anymore. I’ve gotten a taste for the natural rush of gambling and the fact that I’ve made two “huge” comebacks has me feeling like I just can’t lose.

During this time I begin to dub myself the “God of Gamblers”-after the Hong Kong film series of the same- I should know better since I’m agnostic and am normally at least somewhat sensible.