Vegas Baby

Marathon Report

2009-12-07T09:42:00.000-08:00

Just before the run I tweeted that I was about to embark on the physical trial of my life, man, was THAT an accurate statement!

Before that, though, was the entirely unnecessary drama brought about by my being so easily distracted and terrible with details. I forgot to go to the expo the day before the race to pick up my race bib and timing chip! Oh my goodness. They said on the document I had from them that race bibs were not handed out on race day. I remembered two hours after the expo closed with a sudden breaking out in sweat and a deep groan.

I decided to drive to Mandalay Bay's convention center in hopes some poor clerk was assigned the job to take care of mindless people like me. I was greatly relieved to find a sign posted on the closed doors that I could pick it up at 4:15 am at the Solutions tent.

So, my best friend Mark cooked me up a spaghetti dinner for my pre race dinner of carbs. I went to bed early and got up at 230 am drove to the Strip and after an illegal running of the barricades, a feat I seem to do every major race, and driving over a median I parked two casinos down at the Excalibur and made it to the Solutions tent at precisely 4:15, bravo!

Since it was quite cold at 34 F, I went inside the Four Seasons hotel which shares the parking lot with Mandalay Bay and warmed up in this lovely room with a couple other runners from Seattle, Vegas and Australia. The Christmas decorations did my soul good.

Then I went to the Rockin Runners tent to meet up with my running partners. We were planning on being together for the first 11 miles before I split off for the full as they were doing the half. The cold began to seep in but I did escape the point of shivering with my 3 layers of clothing (actually 5, but who's counting).

We were in corral 24 and I was surprised to have to wait for 45 minutes after the gun went off for us to get to the Starting line. But at 7 am, we were off!

I had to run across the street at about mile 4 to catch a porta potty, one of the drawbacks of drinking coffee (but well worth the performance enhancing boost) and was supposed to meet Dee and her daughter Megan at the next light. They reported they waited 8 minutes for me but I saw neither hide nor hair of them and must have passed them right by for they caught up with me at mile 8 when I was in yet another line for a porta potty. I waved them on and discovered inside that I was chafing and bleeding quite a bit- an alarming sight! But a few miles later I discovered how to stop that nasty little problem, for the most part.

Now, this is where my real trouble started. At mile 11 the top of my left foot started hurting for no real reason. I didn't trip or turn it or anything. I thought my laces were too tight and stopped to loosen them but they were not tight at all. A mile and a half later I started walking hoping it would improve. The first slow jaunt I did seemed to be better, but it soon worsened. Just then, I met with Diane from my running team who does a lot of walking. So I decided to join her.

We ended up walking the next 13 miles together. For the first half of that my foot worsened and the sickening realization gripped me, I was injured and it may not go away. I found out the hard way that walking 13 miles in the cold air with a sore foot can get quite painful even if you have recently run 18 miles with little pain.

I was very grateful that I had someone with me and I told Diane so and she replied she felt the same way. With such a damnably long distance ahead of us we both knew discouragement may have caused us to do the unthinkable.

I thought our walking pace was just fine since the cutoff was at the 17 minute per mile pace but we must have not been walking what I estimated to be a 15 minute per mile pace because the race official's car that signified the cutoff was gaining on us. We decided to run. For the last few miles of walking the foot pain seemed to lessen and I was shamefully thinking I was continuing to walk for mere reason of convenience and laziness, you know, going too easy on myself.

The first two quarter mile runs we did actually felt better than the worn out walking pain I was experiencing. Poor Diana, though, aside from her aching muscles that initially forced her to walk so much, she was now experiencing her blisters getting raw. They were quite slow runs, I must admit. And when we did the third and fourth jaunts my foot pain which had transferred to my ankle flared up. I thought I'd have to walk the rest of the way for fear of having a total ankle blowout.

Then James, the organizer of our training team appeared on a corner, he was waiting for his last two runners. He tried relacing my left shoe but the pain did not abate whatsoever. Dianne kept walking and was 40 yards ahead of me. Then the ominous pace car was RIGHT behind me, telling us he was the official car for the cutoff. For the next mile and a half he was in my peripheral vision, a mere couple feet behind me, and I forced my hurting ankle to speed up for fear he would pass me and I would be a DNF, Did Not Finish.

I caught up with Dianne and together we pressed on to about 24.5 miles. By this time I had a slight limp. By mile 25 we passed a couple and I was slightly relieved, but then they passed us back. Ugh, I was thinking if I was lucky enough to finish I would be the Very Last Runner, sheesh!

Then for the last half mile James convinced us to run it in. But I could only go half the speed Dianne was able to muster cuz of the pain. So, I ran with a limp and very slowly passed up about 5 walkers, there was this lovely group of young cheerleaders whooping and cheering and doing back flips for us. I was grateful that they stuck it out for so long a time.

Then came the blessed 26th mile! Only .2 to go and I hoped fervently that I wouldn't have an ankle blowout. The Finish line loomed ahead of me and I beared down trying to go as fast as the pain would allow. I crossed it finally at almost exactly 7 hours and this big burly guy put the quite lovely marathon medal around my neck. A few feet later this cute young gal tied the space blanket around my neck and was so enthusiastically saying how I deserved it that I got choked up thinking about what I had just accomplished. I was a marathon man....

Evening prayer

2009-11-19T18:51:00.001-08:00

Prayer Train

2009-11-18T04:15:00.000-08:00

There's a train of people in my wake
as I journey through life,
people I love and have compassion for,
whom I pray for.
Interceding with heaven,
that I may enjoy their company for eternity in paradise,
rejoicing together in our fellowship with God,
that eternity-long celebration,
and asking that their earthly sufferings be alleviated
and also made to enrich their lives
as Christ's sufferings enriches ours.

I have a lovely train of friends, beloveds and family-
all of whom I hope the best for,
they bring love to my life,
may I ever be so rich....

written tonight at 3 am in Chapel of Perpetual Adoration

The Nearness of God

2009-11-03T03:11:00.000-08:00

I come to the nearness of God in this special, quiet place
With other lowly pilgrims seeking his touch.
I am blessed with the comforts of a caring and present God
In this always open chapel.

I come to the nearness of God and ask of him
Pertaining to all of my desires and all my questions.
I am surrounded by silence and the thoughts of God
In the chapel of adoration.

I come to the nearness of God, afforded in this nook of the church,
Grateful for how close my God is to me,
By his own choice, by his own sacrament,
In this chapel containing his body.

I come to the nearness of God, hungry and hopeful,
Desiring the keeping of promises, glad of his faithfulness,
Eager to receive in the silence
In the Eucharistic chapel.

God is good....

just written at 2 am in the St Bridgets Chapel of Perpetual Adoration

A Major Change In My Life? A monastery, even?

2009-10-21T02:53:00.000-07:00

For a long time I've wanted to start another family. I am disheartened by how my four kids and I relate. We're not close and don't contribute much to each others lives, much of which is my fault, complications arising from my lack of character and the symptoms of my bipolar mood disorder in my younger years. My best friend, Mark's family is very close. When he asks his 3 kids to volunteer and help serve the homeless at Catholic Worker where he and I are on staff, they all come to help out cheerfully. I guess it's not always a good idea to make comparisons...

I love babies and feel young, though I'm pushing 50, look young, too, thanks to my half Japanese genes. And so I've been somewhat searching for a younger woman who wants to bear a couple children into this world.

But I've recently experienced a release in my spiritual life where remaining chaste actually seems a real possibility. That has led me to deepening my spiritual commitments. Combine that with the desire to do something about my fear of death and the desire to live eternally, has me thinking of straightening out my life to be in accordance with the Catholic Church and its teachings.

The Church takes very seriously the words of Jesus. It's one of my main attractions to it. Jesus said remarrying is adultery (the Church teaches only an honest annulment corrects this) and I've been married three times. So, unless I can honestly obtain three annulments, which seems mind-boggling to my ADD brain (long term projects are VERY hard for us), then it would be a grave sin for me to remarry. And since its a grave sin to be intimate with a girl outside of marriage, then I'm looking at lifelong celibacy. Something which seems easier to enjoy since said spiritual release from the fires of lust (which one can only hope is permanent).

Now, I have come to realize that I am drawn to the monastic. I really enjoyed getting up two hours early, a few years ago, and driving to Mark's house for coffee and morning prayer from the Divine Office, an ancient Catholic practice which all the priests, nuns, sisters and brothers in monasteries do worldwide everyday throughout the day. I did that for over a year. I also spent quite a few times a week during that period before the Eucharist in a Chapel of Perpetual Adoration, which the Church teaches is the direct Presence of God. Much of that time was chronicled in my earlier blog The Lucky Man. Reading The Cloister Walk by Kathleen Norris and her other book, Acedia and Me, opened my eyes to the joys and strengths of the monastic life.

Soooo, I am considering becoming a Benedictine Oblate, a third order (layman) member of the huge Catholic order founded by St. Benedict. And perhaps even joining a monastery in a deeper commitment to the order. I don't think I'm eligible to become a priest at my age and education level with all the baggage in my life, but there may be a monastery which would take me in. Or I could lead a life like Kathleen Norris, full of layman commitments and activities while writing award winning poetry....

Now, mind you, these are all thoughts just beginning to percolate inside my often dizzy little head. We shall see where this all goes....

She's here! My first grandbaby

2009-09-29T08:13:00.000-07:00

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I will add more later, but Meavh (a Scottish name pronounced Mayv) was born at 8 lbs 4 oz with long black hair on the 24th!

She was born at home in the master bedroom, her dad was born in a bedroom naturally also 22 years ago. The midwife was trained by her dad's midwife, Kaye Bullock, a lovely lady. She is a quiet baby (lucky parents!) and sweet to behold. Sorry about the blurry picture, more will be published soon.

The paternal joy I basked in the first night was surprisingly sweet. I think she is going to change my life, just like her dad did when he was born. New life, fresh hope, a beginning full of lovely possibilities. Love goes on with this life. Ever expanding circles of love.

Folks, this is what its all about!

New Poem

2009-08-23T04:12:00.000-07:00

I hurt...
You are confused
And you draw lines in your mind
And I have no idea
And you judge
Instead of communicate.

I really don't see
How we can recover from this
You are so broken
and I don't read minds
I hurt...

My favorite hike at RedRock Canyon area

2009-03-06T06:24:00.000-08:00

I declare war on President Obama and his failed policies of the past.

2009-02-27T07:01:00.000-08:00

Every normal man must be tempted at times to spit on his hands, hoist the black flag, and begin to slit throats. -- H.L. Mencken

President Barack Obama has come out of the closet and shown himself to be a flaming liberal bent on destroying the works of President Ronald Reagan, and that, my friends, is a call to arms.

I knew we were in for some trouble, but drew a sigh of relief at his cabinet picks and had no concrete reason for high alarm due to his broad and general campaign outline of himself that he drew and my natural optimism and willingness to give him the benefit of the doubt. But, with announcing his disdain for the free market and his incredible new New Deal programs he outlined Thursday night, he has shown himself to be the quintessential, far left, liberal, big goverment, tax and spend politician on an even grander scale than LBJ.

This is going too far. This is reason to sit upright and pay strict attention. This is a man intent on stealing from the riches of America relying on the old, failed policies of the past, that have done nothing but bring destruction and financial ruin to millions of Americans. And I will use every last ounce of my political strength to oppose my president. This is war.

President Barack Obama is showing himself to be cruel to the poor, and the middle class. For his policies will bankrupt this nation and lead to quadruple the economic turmoil we have seen in the past 18 months. It will devastate the nation and then the world. Freedom is at risk here, prosperity is at risk here. Our very way of life is at risk here.

And I'm not alone in my dire assessment of our new president. There are literally millions of Americans out there who remember the blessings that Reaganism brought to our great nation, who will not sit idly by while the American way is trampled by the lousy tenants of liberalism. This will be a grassroots uprising of the highest order and we will take no prisoners. This is war and the vast majority of Americans will stop this horrible political agenda. Rise up, my brothers and sisters, now is the time, our time to put this Anti-Reagan president and his congressional ilk where they belong: in the ash heap of history.

Slash and burn.

Guest Blogger: What is the most important thing in life?

2009-02-15T10:29:00.000-08:00

Here is one of my Twitter friends answering my very important question...

A Reflection on Parenting

by

Vered (aka v_a_k on twitter)

During one of my first wanderings out and about in Twittervile, I came upon Timaay's question: "Ok, tweeps, in one word, what is the most important thing in life...". .. With hardly a pause, I replied "Parenting". Upon further reflection and the need to elaborate on this without the 140 characters twit-limit, I am happy to endorse that knee jerk response.

Beyond the fact that...

-- giving birth to my son was the single most sensation-packed event I have experienced to date - physical and emotional,

-- becoming a mother has brought about in me a transformation not equaled by any other, redefining the relationship with my own parents and giving me a new perspective on my priorities,

-- the feelings - joy and pain, pride and guilt, love (and yes, even sometimes hate) - are most intense within the relationship with my son...

Beyond all else, I realize that by producing life and nurturing it, I have been granted the opportunity to have a concrete and meaningful impact on the world.

Few of us are born with a gift that allows us to paint "Starry Nights", to compose "The Four Seasons", or to write "The Great Gatsby" - masterpieces that acquired a life of their own and have transcended the lifetime of their creators. But by setting forth and multiplying, each one of us can create an equally, if not more beautiful masterpiece.

As I at times struggle with the desire to "make a difference" through either work, socializing or political activism and the need to tame this desire on account of my shortcomings and the limits of the energy I can muster, I ultimately recognize that my most important sphere of influence is my home and my family. By creating an environment wherein my child can grow to be a productive, responsible, kind and caring person, I make all the difference in the world. And if I am blessed and he grows and matures in such a way as to choose and be able to set forth and multiply as well, then the impact lingers. My essence, my soul - and those of my fore-bearers, manage to survive yet another day, and we will exist in a future in which our names have been long forgotten.

Life persists and I have done the work of God. What more can I ask for?

For comments and more writings visit the Crimson Court
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http://vakoriski.livejournal.com/

] - I would love to hear your thoughts!

Touching Eternity

2009-01-28T04:02:00.000-08:00

How the mystery of God enters my mundane and profane life...

Sometimes when I say the last amen of the Rosary prayer I feel I'm at one with God & the universe. It started in my early days of praying this repetitious prayer when I used a small software application on my home computer that I downloaded for free after a google search. Its amazing the doors that Google unlocks for you...

The application had you hit the amen button as you got to the end of the Rosary and it would take you to the next prayer. When I hit the final amen of the concluding prayer the entire application would disappear, leaving me with my simple PC desktop. The suddenness of that act would transport me to a place where I immediately felt the peace of God and the curious sense of being wonderfully in touch with his presence. I would feel a deep sense of well being and that I was in touch with the entire universe, at one with it, and with its creator.

The feeling often pervades my senses even when I haphazardly pray the Rosary at work in my casino on a dead game where I'd have plenty of time to muddle through what I could remember of the mysteries of that particular day. I'd be standing there at the prayer's conclusion feeling my invisible senses expanding out to the entire universe.

All this sounds grand and wonderfully full of mystery but its always quite subtle and often missed as the profane concerns of my work day would block me from contact with the invisible world. But on occasion, I'd be wrapped in the mystery and sublime beauty of prayer, in touch with my spirit and all of creation.

What this all means in the long run of my stumbling, sinful life I'm not quite sure, but I'm grateful that a little bit of heaven can pervade my earthly life by praying the simple, repetitious Rosary.
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I think I have a chance, folks, for a real good job...

2009-01-26T18:04:00.000-08:00

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My career coach/sponsor, aka my mom, just had lunch with some potential "juice." Telling her about me, an aspiring dealer. That's the most my mom had done to advance my career since I started this Vegas Baby dream.

It is a bit less immediate than I'd prefer in a couple ways. The contact isn't one in a real position of authority, she's a dealer at my fave casino, and the job opening won't appear until at least next December. Sooo, its not like a VP is gonna recommend me for a position, but, another dealer got hired via my mom through this gal merely by listing her as a personal reference on her job application and once the casino at City Center opens up it will be a rather high paying job.

I remember this MGM Grand dealer, with an incredibly extroverted personality, when I was a pit clerk almost two years ago whom I had told of my dealing ambitions, would constantly tell me we would work together at City Center, once it opened up. Well, maybe, that dream will come true. My Vegas Baby ambitions... siiiigh, that would be nice to realize!

Ok, my FIRST EVER New Year's Resolutions

2009-01-04T14:32:00.000-08:00

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Folks, I have never made New Year's Resolutions. They always seemed silly to me, knowing how many times they are broken. But also, I think it's a feature of my ADD, meaning the difficulty we have with long or medium range goals- for our brains they are veeery difficult.

But having successfully reached my half marathon goal with months of preparation and lots of hard work over a sustained period of time I now feel confident that I can make and keep them.

Soooo, the other day I tweeted two resolutions. To run at least two half marathons if not a full, and to lose another 17 pounds. My weight goal is designed to bring me to a BMI rating of normal weight by age 50, 18 months from now. I told a friend at work that by age 50 I want the body of a 30 year old....

And, by God, I think I will do it. I originally decided to run a marathon to build my character, to gain control over my body and strengthen my soul and it is working! Woo hoo! I am so excited and deeply moved.

For a man who's neurological makeup makes things like organization and planning nearly impossible without lots of coaching, this half marathon achievement is revolutionary in my life and how I view my abilities. A few years ago I had a rush of insight and blurted out to my mom, as she saw some employment success building in my life (after 25 years of floundering in the work force), that I was a "late bloomer." The recognition of truth made her laugh out loud.

It takes me a while to get some things right, but I have learned, that at times, I am very persistent and things are starting to come together for me I am happy to report.

There's something else cooking in the back of my mind. I just read with misty eyes a Runner's World article about a gal who started a program for homeless men to improve their lives by running a half marathon. Being one who's life is being enhanced by endurance running and one who volunteers a couple times a week for the Las Vegas Catholic Worker which serves the poor and homeless, where I also live and am taking a greater role in its operation lately, this has profound meaning to me. Perhaps I may inspire some homeless men to overcome their demons the same way I overcame some of mine. We'll see...
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My first half marathon- the longest 3 hours and 17 minutes of my life UPDATED

2008-12-08T03:48:00.000-08:00

Well, after 6 months of training (and 15 pounds), I finished in 6,942nd place in the Las Vegas Half Marathon in less time than I was predicting. That surprised me because I walked miles 11 and 12. Aside from my calf not causing a problem I am most happy that I actually ran the last mile and finished with a relatively strong kick. I must have recalled a first marathon story where the writer said she thought all the people she was passing on the last mile were stupid for not walking the previous mile so they would be fresher for the finish where all the spectators were, because that's exactly what I did.

I set everything up before I went to sleep to make sure I forgot nothing- easy to do when you have ADD.
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I am convinced that running slowly, a 14 minute per mile pace, is more painful than running my natural pace of about 10 minutes per mile. I feel each step much more when I am just jogging. It would feel much better if I actually ran the race.

A few minutes before the start.

I was dreading the cold, having seen the erroneous forecast of 38 F. It never got below 43 and there was absolutely no wind, although it was overcast I saw once the sun rose. I had complained for weeks about the marathon being started so early. The New York Marathon started at 10 am which is perfect for a cold winter-like day. I moaned that the Las Vegas Marathon was only doing this so they could do the fireworks thing and castigated it to be mere Las Vegas hype. But running at that temperature wasn't half bad. I did hear, though, that last year it was too cold.

The start was nicer for us Las Vegas Roadrunners because we were given head of the line privileges. They had a ballroom just for us to gather in and 15 minutes before the start they marched down to a corral just behind the elites and, of course, in true Las Vegas style, the Running Elvi.

I was amazed that I ignored the excitement of the start and the million runners passing me by as I jogged my tortoise pace even during the first mile. I jogged from mile 2 to 5 with my young padawan co-worker/running partner, Missy. She also has ADD and was chomping at the bit to go faster than my tortoise jog. I was convinced she needed to stay at my pace because she had never ran farther than 5 miles and she had cheap running shoes. After 4 miles of me chiding her I told her to go ahead but to walk for a minute every mile marker and not run too fast. She did fine though, finishing 17 minutes ahead of me.

The first two miles it seemed everybody was passing me up. But after six miles there were a lot of walkers and I was passing quite a few half marathoners to my great relief. A middle aged man doesn't need constant reminders of his weaknesses. I was taken back by how this one older man was walking almost as fast as I was running. I called out encouragement to him and he promptly picked up his pace and left me behind- not so good for my male ego.

At around 6 miles I also saw a gal who had a horrible pigeon-footed stride and asked her if she had the right running shoes for her overpronation. She said she did but that these were her "comfies." I hoped they didn't hurt her too much by the end of the 13 miles.

I saw a guy about my age who had medicated pain reliever patches on his calves and asked him about his calf problems. He had tightness like I did. A mile later a younger gal overhead me commenting about my calves and indicated she had the same problem and that was why she was walking. I am trying to find a definitive solution to my too tight right calf.

My best friend, Mark, was the only one to come out and support me. He is the one I think about when reflecting on the proverb about a friend who sticks closer than a brother. After a couple of phone calls (yes, I used my smartphone extensively on my run) I told him to forget about trying to see me both halfway in the run and at the finish line. I did make my mom promise after the run was over to come see me if I run the LV full marathon next year.

While I was walking I met a young Canadian gal who was limping. She told me she had IT band problems and it went out on her at mile 10. I asked if she was doing treatment for her and she assured me that her physical therapist who does this fancy metal device therapy on her (she showed me the big bruise on her thigh to prove it) told her she would be just fine. Poor honey....

I had used electrical tape to print TIMAAY on my shirt and got a few shout outs. Well, this pair of girls shouted it out to me and they looked remarkably familiar. I wracked my brain and then recalled they were two very fun customers of mine on the blackjack table the previous Friday night! Such a coincidence! They were there supporting one of their mothers' who had just passed them doing the full marathon. We walked together for a few minutes laughing about their time at my casino and how one of them got kicked out of Harrah's because she resembled a prostitute Security had previously busted.

So, after 30 minutes of doubt-filled walking at miles 11 and 12 about my ability to continue running I took my last of 4 gels and started running again for the last 1.1 miles. I slowly built up my speed closely monitoring how my calf felt and since it was not tight at all at this point I ramped up to a 10 minute mile. That went so well that once I turned the last corner at the rear of Mandalay Bay with the highly motivating Japanese taiko drums doing a hundred BOOMS a minute, I turned it on full bore for a healthy kick.

I high-fived 6 Running Elvi and promptly went way over to the left just next to the drummers, my heart pounding and pace picking up. I searched for where Mark said he would be, about 50 feet after the taiko drummers and it seemed like I searched every face for 200 feet and I wondered if he had turned away from the exact minute that I approached. But then I saw him and high-fived him too with a big grin on my face.

I turned it up even higher as I was about 50 yards from the finish line and stared at the digital clock readout as I crossed that was shining 3:17:05. I crossed myself like I saw the Kenyan runner who won the Beijing Olympic Marathon and slowed down to get my medal.

When I was walking those two miles with aching feet, a sore back and heavy fatigue I sent a twitter update wondering how on earth people did this for over 26 miles. But it was only a few minutes later that my mind was devising a strategy of how I could train to overcome my specific challenges for a full marathon. I truly believe that endurance athletes are a bit unhinged.

That reminds me of one of my favorite parts of The Spirit of the Marathon documentary, that I drove to LA to see, where this lady is standing at about the 25th mile with a big sign reading, YOU ARE ALL CRAZY.

So Mark and I went to have breakfast and then I came home with 2 bags of crushed ice and took a way-too-cold ice bath. I really felt I was crazy as I was preparing the tub for an icy dip. I promptly learned that while 10 lbs of cubed ice is not enough, 20 lbs of crushed ice is far too much. Parts of my anatomy were in physical pain! UPDATE: But let me tell you about the advantage this gives a runner. The next day my legs were only a little stiff, no pain or fatigue at all. Not one bit. I see now that my legs feel better after a 13 mile run with an ice bath than they do after a 5 miler with no ice bath. Apparently the cold not only reduces inflammation but it forces out the lactic acid filled blood and then when the muscles warm up only fresh, clean blood fills them up. A neat trick, I am toying with the idea of an ice bath even after my 5 milers. They felt that good.

So, my running team is gonna meet for another round starting Sunday, January 4th, and I'm thinking about running the full marathon for the San Diego Rock and Roll Marathon on the last day of May.

Here we go again....

UPDATE: Oh, and the man who sold me my awesome running shoes introduced me to the idea of opening up an Athlete's Foot franchised store here in Vegas. He says the valley is crying out for three more stores. Folks, the first job I ever loved, and there are only two, was running a specialty retail store. So, I am dreaming a bit about becoming a Las Vegas merchant of athletic wear. Hmmm....
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Counterattack

2008-11-05T07:51:00.000-08:00

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Well, I really have to congratulate Barack Obama on a clear victory last night. And to all his supporters, especially to black Americans, this can do nothing but make them feel they are a solid part of the American story.

I was dismayed when I saw that McCain lost and was getting close to panicking when I heard two co-workers say it was a landslide. For a couple hours the implications were staggering me. But I looked it up in Wikipedia when I got home and was relieved to find out an electoral landslide was more like Reagan's 489 to Carter's 49, much different from Obama's current 349 to McCain's 161.

Whew, so, America is not giving the Democrats a mandate from the people. They haven't totally repudiated conservatism, the Republican Party and Sarah Palin completely.

Then the fears swirled around in my head: economic ruin, military defeats, no freedom of speech from the fairness doctrine, self-prostituting judges, 24 hour Chris Matthews and a return to partial birth abortions, among others....

Then came the impulse to declare myself as Obama's loyal opposition, veeeery loyal to him and veeeery opposed to his every liberal thrust. That brought me to thinking more and more about the future which caused me to consider the past. What's the best thing to do when losing a battle? Counterattack!

In my opinion, the best response we could take following a disaster of a liberal presidency after he totally tanks the economy- and I'm not talking 6% unemployment and one quarter of economic downturn, like we have now, I'm talking about double digit unemployment, widespread company bankruptcies, quarter after quarter of negative growth, sort of like stagflation under Jimmy Carter, where the whole country is dominated by a general malaise, then it would be up to us to reassert conservative principles into the public narrative.

So, God help us, true Republican reformers in 2012, like Sarah Palin, people who have already KICKED corrupt Republican ASS, can lay into the Republican leadership and the Democrats too, reform government on the federal level and usher in a new Reaganism, that may just provide decades, once again, of freedom and economic prosperity. It could just happen.

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Comments are open, but be CIVIL, otherwise you're comment will be happily deleted by the admin, ME. So, no insults, cursing or personal attacks, thank you very much.
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More good news

2008-10-03T00:57:00.001-07:00

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Talk about relieved and happy. For years my pulse has been around 100 to 110 beats a minute. Until recently I thought the norm was 60 to 80 and I felt there was something wrong with my heart though, like a typical male, I didn't do anything about it except worry.

Last month I googled about heart rates and found out that the norm was actually 60 to 100, and also that at 110 I may have a slight tachcardia. More anxiety. WELL, this morning while getting that all checked out at the VA Clinic, during my EKG I was happy to find out my pulse was all the way down to 71!!!

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Wow, what a difference! I'm so surprised that 3 or 4 months of running would have such an effect on my cardiovascular system. Can you imagine what getting up to marathon level would do? Right now my longest run has been 9 miles. 26 miles, wow, I will be able to exert myself like a freight train!
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The Gut

2008-10-02T01:16:00.000-07:00

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For decades I have been plagued by the Gut. My body shape was inherited from my father. I remember as a child remarking several times to myself how big his Gut was and how it just stopped at his beltline as if all his fat suddenly stopped by a very strong strap of leather.

Well, I was fortunate enough to gain the same body shape. Lovely. I remember a pregnant gal at work who was 8 months along looking at me one day and saying, “You look more pregnant than I do.” A lovely young lady.

Years later another gal, this time a friend of mine, remarked on the Gut, saying, “It seems like it's not really a part of you.” Now there's a truly lovely gal (no irony this time). It's an accurate statement, my arms are very skinny and my legs are nowhere near fat. It's just that this big Gut hangs on the front of me.

Well, now that I've lost 17 pounds and am training for a half marathon, when I see my dwindling Gut in the mirror I say, “I'm gonna get you, sucka!”

In fact, the other night, I was lying on my back in bed and noticed that for the first time my belly was nearly flat with gravity sucking it in. Wow, I can really lick this monumental appendage to my body, I began to think.

Tonight I examined my body's profile in the mirror and saw that instead of bulging in a complete sphere the Gut actually had a flat aspect to it, after the initial bulge. I squinted my eyes at the mirror.

“I'm gonna get you, sucka!”
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McCain's grand slam finale

2008-09-04T22:18:00.000-07:00

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I'm going to fight for my cause every day as your president. I'm going to fight to make sure every American has every reason to thank God as I thank him that I'm an American. A proud citizen of the greatest country on earth. And with hard work with strong faith and with a little courage great things are always in our reach.

Fight with me! Fight with me! Fight for what's right with our country. Fight for the ideals and character of a free people. Fight for our children's future. Fight for justice and opportunity for all.

Stand up to defend our country against its enemies. Stand up for each other. For a ++++ beautiful _____ America. Stand up! Stand up and fight! Nothing is inevitable here. We're Americans! We never give up! We never quit. We never hide from history. We make history!

Thank you and God bless you and God bless America.

Announcing my crazy ambition

2008-08-31T18:04:00.000-07:00

From couch potato to
marathon runner!
Follow my progress on my blog!
www.vegasbaby8.blogspot

Can a fat slob transform himself into a long distance runner???
Is he crazy, obsessed or just plain determined to achieve such a personal milestone?

Well, we're gonna find out. I have always loved long distance running ever since my freshman year in high school where I raced in cross country competitions. In my early twenties while stationed in the Navy in San Diego I ran a 10k race. Then in my late twenties while living 100 yards from the UNLV running track I got up to 6 mile runs.

Then began the long dormancy and now, 27 years later, I am determined to finish the entire 26.2 mile Las Vegas Marathon on December 7! I have jogged for a couple months now to get the kinks out and plan on joining the Las Vegas Roadrunners' training program for the next 3 months.

I am looking for sponsors to help cover the costs of the race, training program, garments and equipment. Will you help?

The race and training program and package is $155.
Garments are approximately $40
Running shoes are approximately $100
Equipment costs are approximately $45
6 Sponsor tee shirts approximately $100

Total cost approximately $440

Any amount you can help me with will be greatly appreciated.

contact me
TimPoet2002 at yahoo dot com
My paypal account username is the above email addy
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A sendoff

2008-08-14T11:14:00.000-07:00

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My best friend and roommate's daughter is about to leave for a year of university work in Italy. We are having a sendoff for her this Saturday so I composed this for her:

Katie Kay

She is not a wanderer,
Lo, the young maiden is an adventurer
True soul, quiet and still, so strong.

A woman with a purpose
A young lady soon to stretch her soul
and take residence abroad
To see new sights
Make new friends
To learn
To teach.

And we, all gathered here,
In our love for her,
Bid her godspeed
to Italy
and then godspeed
home.

Katie Kay
Traveler over the seas!
Katie Kay
Beloved of our hearts.

Haste, haste away
and when the year is done
Haste, haste to home!
Where we shall gather again
and drink to your name.
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Today...

2008-08-13T18:57:00.000-07:00

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Just got done jogging. 20 minutes non-stop. Gonna make it an hour 3-5 times a week come November. This month's goal is 30 minutes- hell, maybe 45! I am going to take control of my body. I will shape it the way I want it to go. No longer a couch potato!

Likewise, my addiction. I'm going to take control of my lusts just as my body. I will shape my soul into a winner's soul.

Still trying to convince ex I am not a toy, but a man who acted like a boy and hurt her terribly, but still have real feelings and deserve to have those feelings respected.

Be careful when you say you stand, lest you fall....
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Love sucks...

2008-08-11T04:58:00.000-07:00

Wow, isn't it amazing how his voice sounds just like it did in 1975??? Lol...

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So, beautiful Old Flame, aka Singerbabe, and I had sushi to catch up on the latest. She had a miraculous reconciliation with her long estranged father- got me misty-eyed to hear about him holding his sleeping grandbaby.

We concluded that love sucks, is hard and even like war.

"Some tell me that if it's real love then it's easy and I just don't believe it," she said.

She also pointed out that I couldn't have been in love with dreamgirl at first kiss because I didn't know her at that point. After her dissing me last time she was with me I'm beginning to wonder if I ever really knew her. I have an incredible imagination and, apparently, a great capacity to deceive myself.

And this makes me think. When I met Old Flame years ago I fell in love very quickly. None of that 'don't say the word, love, for 6 months.' And I was quickly in love with Annie from England and last December I was getting very loving towards Singerbabe again during the 5 weeks we were seeing each other even though it turned out she was no longer interested to me in that way.

So, am I merely in love with the idea of being in love?

Hmmmmm....
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Loneliness and Pain

2008-08-11T04:57:00.000-07:00

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Its like a black thing,
Dark and heavy, this pain....

It steals my breath
Makes me sweat
When it's not hot.

I see a young couple
And it slowly grinds deeper
On my dull and lonely heart.

Every pretty woman
Reminds me of my failure
To love that woman
As she deserved,
As I deserve.

Oh God, may this be the last time
I ever feel this lonely pain-
The very last time...
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More thoughts

2008-08-08T15:49:00.000-07:00

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Still wondering if she deliberately mislead me out of fear of losing my companionship.
And to give her number to him, that is pure DISRESPECT. Total disregard for my feelings. She treated her ex better than that. Her eyes were totally self-centered.... Dark thoughts. Darker feelings.
It's lovely having met Dutchess, she is going through the same things....
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Thoughts and deeds

2008-08-07T19:41:00.001-07:00

Short jog today around ghetto neighborhood. They're opening a grocery store on the corner. Lost 15 pounds!!
Decided to be accountable to Mark, 24/7 for my inner life.
Two days ago all hope for her died. Bereft and yet looking forward to meeting new women. Stopped crying. Wondering if she led me on deliberately so as not to lose my daily companionship- or am I blame-shifting?
Trying to voice chat with Rhyannon who wants to visit me, perhaps.
Met Dutchess today via Twitter and she plays poker semi-professionally and loves the NFL!!!
Dark days and bright moments....
It all will work out.
This is my year.

Things are looking up

2008-08-02T18:14:00.000-07:00

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It hasn't escaped my notice that many of these blogposts are rather dark and negative. Not too attractive, it seems to me now.
Well, things are looking up.

I have concluded that I am in my season of love after several years of being the lonely man. Now I am the lucky man and things are looking up not only in the romance department. I have completed a year of dealing at the Imperial Princess and may get promoted to full time soon. I am already working full time hours and with this I will be able to have cheap health insurance benefits and be eligible to get pulled a day or two to the Big House where tokes are higher.

And it looks like I may be able to triple my income in the next 6 months. That is, if I can figure out why so many casinos are not giving me interviews like they are to my co-workers. I'm worried that my 26 year old offense is blocking me or the sod who stole my identity with his arrest warrants tagged to my name. That would suck if Bellagio wouldn't hire me cuz of that crap.

I started jogging and using the elliptical in the gym. I hope to run the Las Vegas Marathon in December. It would be so cool if I could reduce my pot belly in half. I already lost at least 7 pounds! Took my belt in two notches and am at the last one and my pants are already loose on me. That is welcome news, indeed.

Now, if I can just find my gracious lover....
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Changes In His Life

2008-06-03T01:20:00.000-07:00

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Some of Vegas Baby's dreams die and others survive.

The woman he loved decided she wanted to go back to her ex when she found out how grave her cancer threat was. However, she was rebuffed by him and she came back to Vegas Baby apologizing for hurting him three days after he broke off contact, telling her he didn't do love triangles. But, nonetheless, she still wanted to reconcile with the old flame.

So Vegas Baby took the hint, and decided to move on with his life, although the gravity of her health demanded he support her through her sojourn through the valley of the shadow of death until she came clear of it and walked in the light of day again.

He was troubled, for he loved her so and felt so bereft, and he wrestled with his soul for days until he realized that his only option was indeed to go on with his life as she urged him to do and seek to make his life as good as he can and find a woman to love who was ready for him. She was even openly encouraging him to seduce another woman and all so, obviously, she was over him.

So he found the wherewithal to go on when a man advised him to thank her for bringing an end to the lover relationship and agree with her that it would be a good idea for them to go their separate romantic ways. It all became so clear to him.

He had beautiful Rhyannon in Second Life who was full of wise advice and clarified for him the truth behind the dynamics between him and her and her ex. They had a 4 year history together and she loved the guy and he only had 5 months of a torrid (at least for him) romance with her. There really was no comparison.

Sure, she had mentioned love and marriage and babies at one time- but that was in passing. He mistook her meaning and got carried away. He envisioned decades of love and all that goes with it. But the truth soon caught up with his foolish fantasies and she let him know where her heart lay. It shook him- shook him deep, but warm Rhyannon was there to kindly explain it to him and even offer comfort and she may even visit him in real life at his casino (she said she wants to bring him a bottle of his favorite scotch).

He has opportunities for romance and ardor in Second Life and at work with Sasa and Korean Mary and with some friends from his past. Vegas Baby's ex-lover was right- he needs to get on with his life....
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Improve your life!

2008-06-02T15:23:00.001-07:00

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Walk/jog

Lose 14 lbs

See a therapist

Bear down on roulette

Call your loved ones weekly

Make $80,000 a yr

Love a beautiful young woman

Drive a red Corvette

Raise beautiful children and grand children!
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I think the dream is dying, folks...

2008-03-05T11:24:00.000-08:00

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It looks like dark times are ahead for Vegas Baby. He just completed a weeklong foray in talking to casino shift bosses all over town. What he found is ominous.

Station casinos recently laid off dealers so all the job openings listed on the Net were going to go the returning dealers.

Golden Nugget shift boss said because of the economic downturn she didnt see any openings for the rest of the year.

There was only one part time job opening he discovered and that had tips that were way too low to help him.

Then today the Treasure Island shift boss said the entire MGM/Mirage casino group had an indefinite hiring freeze, ffs! His juice casinos are under that umbrella. This doesn't look good. Not one bit.

There's a possibility of a decent income as a Dealer-Tainer where he would impersonate a celebrity and get to keep his own tips. But that's only IF his casino will lift the black-listing (as they promised to do) that they imposed on his junior casino dealers in time for him to make money before they take Vegas Baby away in shackles.

His romantic interest has told him that he can;t do some of the things he wants to with her until his finances stop listing to starboard (and who can blame her?). And hours later he realizes that the Vegas Baby dream may be dead.

Dark days, folks... dark days.
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If I never saw you again

2008-02-20T16:44:00.001-08:00

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**********************************************************************************

If I never saw you again
I'd weep an ocean of tears
I'd wail to raise the dead
I'd mourn forever.

If i never saw you again
I'd never look at a woman the same
I'd wander the wilderness aimlessly
If I never saw u again
The stars would wane dull
The winds would barely be a breeze
The oceans would lie still...

If I never saw you again
I'd know I caressed the face of an angel
I'd see that I was the luckiest man
I'd recall forever the best days of my life with you
If I never saw you again...

The State of Vegas Baby

2008-01-05T13:57:00.000-08:00

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Vegas Baby is on the edge...

Two unpaid tickets have gone to warrant with another pending. Bank just mentioned repossession of his new car, he cant afford to register it, his bank acct crashed again and is $200 in the hole and the gas tank is empty and his 2 angels are done helping (not that he blames them) and he's got $5 for the next 6 days...

His millionaire ex wife is still hitting him for hundreds a month for back child support. His impoverished ex wife lends him $40 here, $100 there and cheers him on.

Vegas Baby is not a lazy man. Most men and women will roll up their sleeves and get another job like Vegas Mom used to literally scream at him to do. Vegas Baby's been resisting working a second job because bipolar kicks his ass when he does.....

He's had a knife pulled on him before

The last time he worked two shifts a week, when he was still pit clerking at the MGM Grand and going through Imperial Princess's orientation he couldn't recall anything seconds after receiving verbal instructions, his eyes burned for days, mania began to set in, his personality changed and he starting getting violent.... When he informed Vegas Mom about all this she said, "Well, then, you better quit your MGM job...."

Though it makes him cringe, sometimes Vegas Baby has to pause and admit to his innermost self that even though at times he is rather functional and has never had psychosis, nevertheless, he is indeed seriously mentally ill. His ruined Naval career stands as dark testimony to that as well as a dozen other dismal monuments.

Vegas Baby's only 6 months from getting the verifiable 12 month experience the posh casinos want at which point he can get juiced in to his $80,000 plus a year glorious dealing job. But can he make it?

The parent corporation of the Imperial Princess has some rule going and they won't let him transfer to their other properties and they haven't given him more than 3.5 days a week of work for months now.

He's in a dire race to beat the jailers and repo men to the finish line; its getting awfully close and doubts assail him. Then he hit upon a plan as he was adding up the hundreds and hundreds of dollars he needs to get himself out of the hole.

So, he went to the casino boss, Johnny, who originally hired him, an affable upfront guy, who, unbeknownst to him until the day he was interviewed, used to play golf with Vegas Dad when he was a dualie at the same casino years earlier. He told the boss that his finances were going down the tube and he was about to drown and asked him for help getting a full time dealing job at another casino.

He specifically asked to not be promoted to the sister casino where IP dealers got promoted to, because he didn't want to generate hurt feelings of his fellow dealers. But Johnny told him he couldn't lift the blacklist to other properties. He said he would see if he could get him an audition at the sister casino.

Later that day he spoke with Vegas Mom and she said to not worry about what others may feel. That he had to think of himself first. He had to get himself established in Vegas and pay his bills. That this sort of thing happened all the time.

He spoke with Vegas Daughter and she pointed out that any of his dealing friends would do the same thing if they got offered a boost up.

So, perhaps things may turn around for Vegas Baby before he gets thrown in jail or his car is repo'd. It will be about another month before the auditions start. He did go to the Tuscany and audition for a full time job, though he thinks the boss had already ruled him out before he started because he didn't audition him on roulette like he did the other 4 prospective dealers before him.

In the meantime Vegas Baby is looking for a second job at Slots A Fun and Dealer's Employment Agency hoping he can ride the bipolar wave without hurting someone on the road.

If he does get promoted to the sister casino then his income would increase two and a half times. Vegas Baby is crossing his fingers and saying his prayers....
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Me- anal retentive?

2007-12-30T07:04:00.001-08:00

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Omg, I'm the biggest slob in the world (at home)! How can one with an ADDled brain like mine be anal?

You should see my bedroom and the back seat of my car! It ain't pretty, folks.

Wikipedia says:

A person with such attention to detail that the obsession becomes an annoyance to others, and can be carried out to the detriment of the anal-retentive person.

I was bitching in the break room about not getting enough roulette time and Frank, a floorman, said, "You know what you're problem is? You're too anal! Yes, you are- you make sure every stack of chips is so straight it slows your game down and when you are pushing a stack of 100 checks out? Oh man, you stand there and correct the slightest tilt so that you irritate the customers."

My jaw dropped- but then, in a flash, I could see exactly what he was saying. Just the day before I posted on my favorite internet forum the oddity of my personal slobbiness compared to my constantly straightening out things at work.

I think it started at my last casino when I was a pit clerk. As a pit clerk you have a lot of down time and then suddenly a customer wants a $20,000 marker and 2 other floormen ask you to print up a Player's Card for 3 customers and Bam! you have to scramble to get these done in 5 1/2 minutes.

So, when I would be in one of these rushes and something was out of place and I couldn't find it or an item was missing, I would flash with interior rage and want to throw something across the pit. Once I hit a customer in the arm with a stapler- just kidding!

So, quite often on my many down times I would go through the pit straightening things out and making of list of missing items. It would burn me up if I was in the middle of pit 10 trying to get a marker printed up and assembled in 190 seconds while a floorman was standing over me and there would be no damn stapler and I would have to rush over to the next podium to staple the gorram marker- arrrgh!

So, I called my rummaging forays and straightening sessions anger management. The goal was to keep me from letting fly a curse or a stapler in the middle of a rush.

Hence, I became anal retentive.

Nowadays, I remember my early days as a scrub dealer 12 years ago when the floormen used to walk by my table and growl at me, "Fix your rack!" That was a novel concept for my ADDled brain. It makes much more sense for me today.

So, I am constantly pausing my game (only for a few seconds) and making sure all my checks are in stacks of 20 and are only being emptied from the right side of the rack. When I first come on the table I do not look at my customers, I look down and see what sort of mess the previous dealer left for me and start straightening things up. Then I look up at my customers and deal with their "Oh no, Frank's gonna take all my winnings" anxiety. (Players are the most superstitious people- it's really kinda amusing- when I gamble I harbor none of that- it's pure logic to me)

Quite often, on a dead table, I will discover a stack of checks in my rack to be at 19 or 21 (I've learned how to count the checks, difficult as that may seem) and will call a floorman over so I can straighten it out. When the black checks are wrong it drives me nuts.

So there you have it, Frank, the Vegas Baby, is anal retentive. Good God, next thing you know I'll be giving seminars on how to organize your life!
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Mistake corrected, thanks to a star employee

2007-12-29T16:14:00.001-08:00

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Wow, not only did he get Swing back- but he got his seniority restored, too!

Vegas Baby sure lucked out. Eric, the Imperial Princess's scheduler, did his usual professionally excellent work and with one call yesterday put him back on Swing for the week after next and on top of that set it up so he got his seniority back!!!

This is not the first time Eric has come through for Vegas Baby. He did a great job accommodating his start at the Imperial Princess too. Every time he called Eric he got a professional and thoroughly competent response. Great customer service.

Kudos to Eric, the star scheduler.

Doh!!! I made a mistake and lost my seniority...

2007-12-28T15:03:00.000-08:00

I overreacted to a certain type of stress from an individual source on Swing shift and lost shift seniority.

Instead of taking a floorman's advice and confronting the stressor source politely I fled. I suppose it's a bit of cowardice. The emotional intensity of this stressor colored my vision so strongly that I failed to see the advantages of taking the floor's advice. So, I fled like a whipped dog.

I submitted my request to change to Days. I felt very angry about having to do so for several moments throughout that week. I did nothing wrong (except to refuse the advice and give the stressor a chance to be human) and now I had to lose the friendships I forged and all the other perks of Swing.

A couple days before I found out my request was approved the stressor did indeed become much more human and all the stress ceased. I wondered if it were too late to rescind my request.

Three days later the new schedule came out with me on Days AND with Friday and Saturday off- argh, I forgot we lose seniority when we switch! I had just started getting weekend shifts with the higher tokes, damn!

Well, yesterday as I was discussing my income problems with my international friend who was visiting from across the Pond, I was telling her how I called Eric, the scheduler and found out that there would be no real job time improvements due to any dealers quitting to work at the Palazzo which is opening any day now. Which means I will still only be working 3 to 4 days a week and had to get a second job.

In mid sentence I suddenly realized that my chances of working a second shift were drastically reduced by my switch to Days. On Swing I don't report to work until 8 in the evening. Which gives me about 6 hours from 1 pm to 7 pm where I can work a second job. But on Days my time is too limited to work a typical part time shift. Soooo, I decided I would have to go back to Swing.

Also, it dawned on me that I could not attend family dinners if I worked from noon to 8 pm. And Christmas dinner was so wonderful I really do not want to miss them... ever.

So, that is how Vegas Baby lost his seniority.

Christmas in a casino

2007-12-16T06:38:00.001-08:00

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Got my first Christmas card of the season.

It came from the sweetest dealer in Las Vegas, Monica from Vietnam. She is the epitome of fresh and sweet and innocent. Though she's tasted the sadness of widowhood in her 20s she is a spring of goodness and cheer, perfect for Christmas.

Monica

She brought tears to my eyes when I read her note to me on the card. She really isn't big into Christmas, coming from the Far East, but she is big into giving in her frank, refreshing manner. This is what she said:

It's been my pleasure to work with you. You are a very warmhearted person, always willing to help people. Hope all your dreams come true (I know one of them: become the best dealer in Vegas....)

She has this distinctive little girl voice to accompany her innocent nature. She says that she will be so embarassed if she turns 40 and still has a child's voice. I tease her a lot. I tell her to say in a deep voice, "Don't mess with me, sucka!" And she blushes and smiles and even does it on occasion.

One of her favorites is, "I'll drink all ya bitches unda the table!" Irony is not lost on her.

When she was an infant for several months her grandmother would wrap her all up in a box and take her to the hospital where she worked. Monica was her baby in a box!

She and Mike and I were the only dealers to get together for a cheap casino Thanksgiving dinner at Ellis Island, since my casino family always celebrates it early and they didn't have anyone here to share it with. We plan on seeing a Christmas day movie together.

This is a juice town where folks look out for one another when they have established ties. We are establishing such ties. I would be glad to help them get a better job in the future if the opportunity arises and I'm sure they would do so themselves.

On a side note, I see my role in the sometimes surly casino world as one of building ties, of earning other's favor and building circles of friends who will help each other over the decades just as Milo helped us all through my childhood.

Anyhow, Monica just earned the Sweetest Dealer in Vegas Award. Congrats, Le!
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How to Survive and Thrive as a Break-in Dealer

2007-11-24T04:57:00.001-08:00

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Okay, so you're on the way to fame and riches as a Las Vegas dealer. Sure you're in a house now where you're earning under a $100 a night usually. But one day if you play your cards right (hahaha) you'll be earning over $70,000 a year.

But how do you make sure you survive the many pitfalls of a break-in dealer? How do you thrive in the meantime?

Here are some simple guidelines that can help you make it to the Big House.

These come from dealers with decades of experience in Las Vegas gaming, so listen up and make sure you stay on the right track.

First Rule: Never correct your own mistakes on a table game.

When you make a mistake on the table always call the Floor over. Remember you're being watched by Surveillance and you're handling thousands of dollars so every move you make is being watched by the Eye carefully.

Even if you've called your Floor over several times already and you don't want to look stupid by calling him over again- call the Floor boss over anyway. You just have to do it.

My dealing mentor who has 30 years experience told me that she's seen dealers get fired for making their own corrections. (I HATE when that happens...) And these are dealers with years of experience. A break-in dealer on probation or with less than a year's experience is even more vulnerable.

Second Rule: Never argue with your Floor.

Just do exactly what they say. He is the supervisor and if anything goes wrong it's on him or her. Plus when things are stressful during a game and a fast decision needs to be made it is best if only one person is making it. There is little room for a quarrelsome dealer in a break-in house.

More to come ...

AND what questions do you have about dealing that you would like to know? Email me at jimbo123@live.com.

Jobs Galore in Vegas!

2007-11-17T03:42:00.000-08:00

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Ok, folks, this is the first wave of the great opportunity for Vegas dealers (and all hotel employees as a matter of fact).

Vegas Baby has been very unsatisfied with his financial outlook lately. Having to dodge cops because of not being able to register his car, let alone cover his other bills has been driving him to distraction, not that that is hard to do.

Some days he would just sit at home in his digital cavern doing his own online thing and avoiding going out, not leaving the house once to spare him unnecessary drama and terrible costs if he gets stopped by Metro or the Highway Patrol.

He asked to be promoted to dual rate supervisor/dealer since many of his fellow scrub dealers are doing so and they are getting almost 40 hours of work every week. He then hit up break-in casinos around town, especially downtown for full time jobs. As well as signing up at the Dealers Employment Agency and a Temp agency for telemarketing gigs. None of which yielded any fruit.

Now suddenly he realizes that the first big shift in the dealer employment in the Vegas scene that his Vegas Mom and Dad have been telling him about which will make dealing a very lucrative career in a third of the time it took them is upon him. The first wave of an impending three. Next is City Center and then the Encore.

City Center

Wynn's Encore

Just 3 days ago Vegas Baby planned on settling for 40 hours a week at a break- in casino so he could make ends meet at about $31 grand a year. But as he became aware that the new casino expansion opening was looming and he was coaching a fellow break-in at the Imperial Princess who had 9 months experience to shoot for the top casinos and start making $70 grand a year plus, it hit him.

Vegas Baby has Juice.... Sure he has to learn his games and still hit the pavement to hustle for the good jobs but not like this gal did. Sure she was a cute young and pretty Asian girl, but she didn't have a patron in the industry that's famous for connections to achieve career advancement. He has Juice!

So he called Vegas Mom and introduced the idea of exercising said juice next month. She sputtered and backtracked.... Vegas Baby realizes she doesn't want to be embarassed by her ADDled brained son. And he understands her sentiment. No one wants to look bad to peers they have known for decades.

But Vegas Baby has grown much in the past decade. Sure he got into trouble in his 20s and never held a job for long until his 40s. BUT he did hold a banking job for over 6 years recently and he is sure that fact motivated Vegas Mom to encourage him to get into gaming with the idea of her using her influence for him- something she never would have done 10 years ago when he tried dealing previously withou daring to breathe a syllable about using her juice for him.

So, this is the scoop for the Vegas dealing scene:

The Venetian, a very posh megaresort, is about to double with an expansion called The Palazzo. Where they will be hiring beaucoup dealers- and there will be hundreds of them who will be putting their 2 week notices in around Wednesday, November 28th, he would guess, since Palazzo's Orientation starts on December 11. So he figured the rest of the casinos in Vegas will get the idea that they will have to do massive hiring around Monday, December 2nd. And smart, savvy dealers like him and those who read this blog will be hitting the casino bosses up that Monday.

Sooo, while Vegas Baby will be hitting up break-in downtown casinos and elswhere in town, hell, even Mesquite! he is also gonna probe for positions at his 3 fave casinos all of which generate more than $70,000 a year in income and are truly dream jobs as far as morale and a great working environment go.

Vegas Baby is getting excited!

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Might be the last blog post for a while...

2007-10-16T16:19:00.000-07:00

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Vegas Baby has been in a funk for a few days lately. His atrocious financial problems are overwhelming his ADDled brain.

He expects the cable company to cut off his Internet connection tonight since his check by phone payment bounced this morning.

So, Vegas Baby is thinking of any last things he might wanna say to the three and a half readers of his blog....

There is a minor controversy at his casino about which hand to use to pay the 2 spots that are to the dealer's left on a multi-deck blackjack game. The issue is when a dealer pays those spots with his right hand then he basically turns his back on the right hand spot (third base), leaving open the possibility that player could cap his bet or something. He was trained to pay with his left hand to prevent such a thing. So, when he saw Liao, the sweet, mild-mannered new dealer, pay with her right and corrected her on it she said she was trained that way.

So Vegas Baby brought it up to a floorman and he agreed with her, pointing out it would cause the dealer to no longer cover the exposed card on the shoe and decrease game protection. Another floorman told him paying with the right hand was Imperial Princess's policy but a left handed payment was so small an issue they don't correct dealers on that during a game. That floorman also said since the third base player is already paid off at the end of a hand then there is no longer a concern about him capping his bet.

So, the next hour Vegas Baby was on a multideck game the first base player busted and as he went to pick up his lost bet he realized that indeed at this point in the game his back would be to the third base player. So, he decided to stick with his training on that.

He called Vegas Mom about it and she said her standard, "Do what the Floor says, don't argue..." but also said it was ridiculous to pay with one's right hand. The first floorman said in order to avoid third base capping to "walk the table" which means step toward the first base player when taking the bet with the right hand to make it easier to keep an eye on third base. But the right handed action still seems to Vegas Baby to make his back turn too much to effectively protect third base.

Vegas Baby thinks the value of covering the front card on the shoe is low compared to preventing capping a third base bet....

For any dealers who might be reading this (all one of you), what say you? Vegas Baby wants to know.

Kudos To The Most Powerful Black Man In America

2007-10-06T23:20:00.000-07:00

and quite vilified too, since he doesn't fit the politically correct mold of a powerful black man.

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Clarence Thomas who grew up facing discrimination, segregation, utter poverty (he once lived in an unheated house with no plumbing and raw sewage in the backyard) under a deeply principled father figure went on to become a Justice of the Supreme Court.

For that and his unapologetic conservative views he was said to be not black enough, an Uncle Tom,

amongst other things and at his confirmation hearings in the US Senate he was bullied and browbeaten in a liberal litany typical of qualified conservative judicial appointees, but then came Anita Hill who falsely accused him of sexually harassing him. The sheer ludicrousness of her claims are another story.

But this man stopped the liberal crank senators in their tracks and left them speechless with one simple statement. After which they went on to send his nomination to the floor where he was successfully confirmed. The bold and truthful statement that shut the mouths of his detractors? Well, here it is:

This is a circus. It's a national disgrace. And from my standpoint, as a black American, it is a high-tech lynching for uppity blacks who in any way deign to think for themselves, to do for themselves, to have different ideas, and it is a message that unless you kowtow to an old order, this is what will happen to you. You will be lynched, destroyed, caricatured by a committee of the U.S. Senate rather than hung from a tree.

You can hear it for yourself at 5:25 of this YouTube video, which is part 3 of a 60 Minutes interview last Sunday of Clarence Thomas.

Well, this week his autobiography was released, My Grandfather's Son. I bought it as fast as I could. You can get it from Barnes and Noble, but it must be selling fast because they take 1 to 3 weeks to ship, Amazon takes 3 to 6. I bought it at the local Borders.

Let me recommend this books, folks, it shows how a great thinker was shaped by his childhood. It shows the struggle and sufferings one must endure to achieve greatness. If you want to be great, read it and take the lessons to heart.

*** Vegas Baby knows this is a departure from his usual writing style, but he was overcome with passion for the truth and admiration for a truly great man and could not help himself. So deal with it.

Dark days ahead...

2007-09-25T16:33:00.000-07:00

Once more doubts about his successful future assails Vegas Baby....

He is awash in cash debt. New car's down payment, insurance and registration has absolutely no room in his weak, spindly budget. He realized he should have seen this coming, but when it comes to details, he rarely has such foresight....

And to complicate matters he made a huge mistake and totally depleted his bank account. He felt the extreme fool with $8 to his name for another 10 days before payday.

Sooo, on his Task List on his smartphone he has a) pick up button extenders and b) get $2500.

And to think, he spent $2000 on his dying Caddy's cooling system just before it overheated and killed the engine.

Oooh, he could use that money now. That was the last of his savings from his 6 years in the credit card industry. But, he does have his angel who is gonna send him $350 which is a big sigh of relief....

Saving The World

2007-09-19T05:04:00.000-07:00

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She really doesn't believe that I am saving the world by playing Solitaire and drumming to music. I explained to her how I was beating back the dark forces of defeatism every time I won a game- which she calls Patience in her British manner, they have such silly ways with the English language.

“I began to realize the import of winning at Solitaire, Mary, when I noticed that just before I would win it would appear so bleak. The right card just wouldn't show up and there was the looming threat of the order I was trying to create being bogged down by the forces of chaos.” I said to her over a few pints of ale. That's Anglo for beer, silly Brits.

“Rubbish!” was all she said.

“Yes, dear, I was winning out over the rubbish of the cosmos!” I said, wiping my chin and looking at her hazel, mocking eyes. She has constantly insulted me from the week I fell in love with her. Apparently the Redcoats think that's endearing. I still hadn't forgiven her for calling me an idiot in front of my friends during the Superbowl last year.

I waved my hands in the air. “You see, we are in a constant battle with chaos, the waste of the world clouding our creative expressions. And when I win at Solitaire, when I persevere once again at the task of organizing that small universe and pay no attention to the nagging doubts clawing at the back of my brain, telling me to just give up, it's useless and will get me nowhere- when I overcome all obstacles strewn in my path, I add to the victory and success of the whole planet! Don't you see?”

“Pillock!” Was her brief reply. I looked at her, trying to remember the distinction between pillock and bullocks and bollocks, my mind swimming in more confusion. There were thoughts of idiots, big male steer and testicles rolling around in my head.

“And when I do synchronized percussion to my favorite songs I am also beating back the forces of chaos....” I said, downing the last of my ale.

“Synchronized percussion, bloody hell, you cheeky bugger!”

“What?” I protested.

“Your use of English is a bit overmuch, you pikey.” She said, and then tossed back the last of her ale. “You really mean drumming- synchronized percussion... really!”

“Well, it denotes more of what I wanna say. Drumming is- is so generic!”

“Rubbish! It's the everyday way of speaking. You've been reading too much Macbeth, my literary genius...not!” She said, her hazel eyes once again mocking me. “And don't use denote, pah- ur such a ham.”

I sighed and said, “So, you really don't believe I'm bringing one iota of good into the world?”

“Not by your Patience and banging your fingers on the table top, you silly bugger. You do it by being open and kind and by spouting your values in your silly, playful way.” She said, her soft green eyes staring directly into mine.

“Hmmm,” I said, “Mary of South London... I love you.”

A new car? He thinks he might be out of the woods...

2007-08-23T10:01:00.000-07:00

"A Chevrolet HHR... wtf is an HHR?" Vegas Baby thought to himself. "Oh, that's what it is... yuck!"

It ain't no

and it sure ain't no

but beggars can't be choosers and he was very grateful that he was driving instead of walking and taking the gorram bus.... AND it has COLD air conditioning, is zippy enough for a 4 banger, has a decent sound system and it's NEW! That's an odd feeling, a brand new car, maybe he'll make it after all, he thought to himself....

Vegas Baby had consigned himself to the state of carlessness in his heart of hearts. Then a mailer came from Fletcher Jones Chevrolet claiming he could get funded for a car note and to call and submit this secret code and he would be told how much. "Yeah, right," Vegas Baby thought to himself. BUT he did just get approved for a couple teeny credit cards and maybe....

The dealership called him the very next day and after mulling it over for a few days, he thought he might as well go in and see what could happen. He was only on the new job for 3 months and just before that he got turned down four times by other car dealerships on a $12,000 car and had no money for a down payment, so Vegas Baby thought his chances for getting approved for a car were about the same as his chances of finding a good woman- wait- he did find a good woman! Hmmmm....

So, he went in and Fletch himself

asked him, "What about a new car?" after looking at an 05 Nissan Sentra with 26,000 miles on it and he said, "Sure...." And the rest is history.

As Vegas Baby was writing this blog post, Fletch just called him and told him the loan was approved and his payments would be lower than predicted and to come in tomorrow to sign the documents. "Wow," the future millionaire thought to himself, "a good woman, generous friends, healthy kids, a new career, and now, a new car... all this and heaven, too!"

Confessions of Vegas Baby and Can One Really Love One's Job? And Dangerous Thugs

2007-08-05T04:21:00.000-07:00

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10 at night and no ride- Dealer Buddy got off an hour before Vegas Baby- so it's a $2 ride on the behemoth bus home.

Vegas Baby raised an old friend on AIM in West Virginia, a college student genius. That helped to pass the boring bus ride time.

His international lover told him the day before that she'll be largely unavailable that day so he didn't try to hard to sms her. He forgot that they frequently posted their daily doings on twitter.com. There is even a way they can send their sms's to each other to avoid international text charges, but he couldn't figure out how to do that.

Vegas Baby remarked to his self about how much he loved the casino industry. He always liked to play 21 and discovered during his pit clerk job that he loved to serve people. Pit clerking was only the 2nd job in 31 years of working that he loved. And he felt the same about dealing.

During his first couple weeks, when he was just learning the huge amounts of little details of pit clerking, he despaired that he would be terminally bored at it. But after mastering the basics he found he loved meeting the needs of the players, dealers, floormen and pit bosses.

His greatest delight was meeting a need discerned by his intuition and observation before anyone asked him to do anything. Sorta like Radar O'Riley on MASH.

He thought for years that his was a sales-oriented personality, since he spent years selling on the phone in different capacities. First as a hardcore telemarketer then as a customer service rep in a credit card call center then as a collections agent for the same bank.

But this pit clerking job taught him that he had a deep need to meet other people's needs. At the same time that he discovered this, geniusbabe, his second fave friend on Second Life, told him after he showed her this line he composed at his pit clerk job one night, "I am your ally, I am your servant. Together we will vanquish every foe," that he may really enjoy exploring the BDSM role of a "sub." to which he replied, "bullshit, I'm too independent for that." her patient explanation of such role-playing made him think twice.

He never took it up, though, realizing that he didn't really fit that mold. There were very few molds he did fit....

On the bus he chatted up 1 of 3 girls he mistook as Italians but were actually from the Czech Republic. She expressed surprise at his age and that he didn't look European at all.

After the girls got off, Vegas Baby made the mistake of cocking his head to the side and glancing back at some noise coming from some punk's music player, loud and distorted which repeated over and over. Two black teens then got up from the back of the bus and sat next to him and the one closest to him started dancing in his seat, singing snatches of rap and staring straight at Vegas Baby. After a couple minutes Vegas Baby looked at the dancing boy and the black kid stared back at him and gyrated, rolling his head back and forth.

Before he could think, Vegas Baby said in a loud voice, "Are you fucking with me?" The negro youth simply stared at him and gyrated.

His cohort spoke up, "Nigger just enjoying his music."

Vegas Baby, knowing his mood would not allow him to stay silent and that there were several more black youths behind them, stood up and walked down the stairs of the doubledecker. While the Negroes said a few more words.

The Deuce turned in to the DTC and he got off, carefully monitoring their movements behind him. He heard one of the Negro teens say, "Are you fucking with me?"

He wished he had a gun once again. And he was relieved they walked to the opposite end of the depot.

He decided not to wait at the depot for the 35 mins before the next 215 E left. He walked the 100 yards to Fremont Street.

On then way he saw a production crew working on a commercial for IHOP.

Once ensconced at the Four Queens he counted his change and bought the football full of beer, 40 ounces for $9, including tip, and stayed in the air conditioned casino free of Negro youths.

Questions in the dark

2007-07-27T22:34:00.000-07:00

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As he strode through the streets on a hot, sweaty night seeking his home, Vegas Baby asked himself, "Do future millionaires actually walk the dark streets of ghetto Vegas cuz they're too poor to drive?"

Taking the Strip bus home

2007-07-25T23:51:00.001-07:00

Crap! Vegas Baby thought to himself, his ride home fell through. His dealing buddy got called to get home to his baby fast.
He took another pull on his Bud Light as he sat at the bar at O'Sheas, the casino next to his. They had this midget dressed as a leprechaun who got up on the bar blasting this whistle and giving willing gamblers a free shot of some green concoction. He waved the little guy away as he stood over him in bright green shorts and a green bowler.
He didn't like waiting for a bus when it was 100` after dark. Dealer Buddy was a tamed hellion, who's hard drinking and gambling ways were brought to heel by the birth of his baby boy. Vegas Baby had never seen a soul so turned around so deeply. He could tell Dealer Buddy was totally committed to his new family.
He drained the last of his cold beer and left the leprechaun to his act. He had a bus to catch. He swam through the crowded sidewalk and made his way to the Deuce stop in front of the Flamingo. He almost argued with the bored bus driver over the cost of a transfer fare being $5 almost 2 1/2 times the normal fare. Instead he looked the bus driver in the eyes and paid the one way fare.
Dealer Buddy and he formed an instant friendship the first day they met during Orientation. He was half Vegas Baby's age yet there was a strong equanimity between them. He offered him a place to stay at a decent price. He even found a used car for sale. Except it was an old Bronco and if he was gonna pay $1200 ( and where the hell was he gonna fine that money?) on a car he wanted something Asian due to their durability.
Tomorrow was payday and he wanted to delay any money decisions until he saw the dough in his Acct. He often had to do things in simplified and segmented ways to better sort through the dizzying minutiae of detail which easily boggled his ADD brain.
He was driving his international lover to despair with his convoluted ways. She would go back and forth between romantic delight in his poetic ways and utter agony over his idiosyncracies. Weeks before meeting her a dear friend in Second Life once asked why he was lonely, given his looks and what she saw of his character, he was at a loss for words at the time but after witnessing Loverbabe's reactions he was once again reminded of the maddening reasons. One of his favorite ex's, Singerbabe, told him at the end of their love affair, "I love you but I can't live with you."
He leaned against the glass resting his forehead on his arm and looked at the wedding chapels pass by and listening to a tourist telling another about that chapel where Brittany Spears got married for a whole 23 hours. He looked at the cars on the darkened street and thought about how he was gonna have his one splurge once he made over $60,000 a year: a brand new red Corvette. And how he would install a very loud foghorn in it for the idiots on the road as well as a powerful loudspeaker also for the ever-present fool.
Almost the entire bus emptied at the Fremont Street stop. The tourists were on their way to more of the rougher glories of Vegas. He was left alone in the upper deck of the Deuce.

He looked at his watch and thought he might make the bus that goes closest to the Compound without running 6 miles out of the way first. He had 7 minutes.
He looked at all the different people at the DTC at 10 30 PM on a Wednesday night and wondered how many stories they had to tell.

How did the old man get crippled?

What was the drunk Indian's father like?

Life can be humuliating

2007-07-24T10:25:00.000-07:00

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Vegas baby wakes up to realize he has no money for the bus.................

He calls a friend for a ride to work and she initially agrees then berates him for his lifestyle and retracts her offer.

He calls his daughter who hasn't the time.

He finally calls one of his sons who is on the way.

Vegas Baby knows one must suffer in this life, especially if one is trying to achieve a big win. Especially if one has bipolar and the deep impulsitivity of ADD.

Sometimes, when it is darkest, he wonders how much he can take.

He turned the car rental in last night. He got a message from the mechanic who charged him $2000 for overheating the past 6 weeks that he was incurring storage charges on the car that died of overheating problems.

He listened to his friend berate him for dropping the intense prayer lifestyle he led for the past couple years. "This is God telling you to get back right with him." Ugh.

He has to call the sods at Enterprise to tell them the car is still on the Stolen Vehicle list. And that it needs to be recovered by the police or the next driver can get stopped at gunpoint with them thinking he's the car thief.

He has good friends and he thanks God for them. But he sure has his dark moments....

Things will get better, he thought to himself, they have to, right?

This is Vegas, baby!

2007-07-22T02:09:00.000-07:00

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I went to my old haunts tonight with my lovely 18 year old daughter and her beau for my birthday dinner. She mentioned she was low on money and I was dead broke so I decided to go to my old casino where I worked closely with the floormen and pit bosses as a lowly pit clerk.

I was a bit anxious at exposing myself and mooching for dinner and wondered if it would take me an embarrassingly long time. But at my first stop in pit 10 I saw Nancy, the dual floorman and pit boss. She had always been excellent in her customer service to me as a boss and the day she discovered I got hired to deal at the Imperial Princess she confronted me and told me to see her after I dealt for a year and she would get me a job at one of a couple of Strip casinos (my guess is the tips at them average around $60k/yr) which honored me to no end.

Well, I told her it was my birthday and she asked me if I was hungry and then wrote a comp for the 3 of us and 2 rounds of drinks. What a fine boss!

So, we went to the casino coffee shop, which, folks, is quite a thing at a posh Strip casino, one of the largest in Las Vegas. Well, you can see from the pictures that it was a great meal. Steak and lobster (filet, that is), Rib Eye steak, chicken fajitas and 3, count em, 3 appetizers. The waiter kept trying to give us more and more food, all for a better tip, of course. Huge Scampi, chicken wings and the best Brushceta I've had in years.... The check was over $200. This joint knows how to treat you nice.

My daughter kept expressing guilt over the extravagance, and asked me how I knew the bosses here and all. I just explained to her that this how Vegas worked. We take care of each other.

I told her it's like we are building covens of followers whom we help along the way in the casino industry. I told her about Milo (true name since this is post-humous), the man I never met but who benefited my family economically for 20 years. Mom would always talk about how Milo did this for her and did that. As he prospered and went from a better casino to another better casino he always took my mom with him. And she made more and more money. One day she told us that Milo died. Our juice who had prospered our family for 2 decades was gone.

But by then she had widened her juice network and eventually landed jobs at the top casinos in town, earning almost six figures. Yes, folks, I said six figures. In fact, it was a six-figure amount she showed me that fateful day last summer when she took me out for lunch to compare our incomes and illustrate my need to jump on the Vegas money train.

Now, she has juice waiting for me when my dealing skills get to par, especially my roulette. But, she wisely suggested to take the pit clerk job at the famous casino I mentioned where I have generated my own juice.

You see, folks, if you have a commitment to excellent customer service and you work hard at it, which wasn't hard for me cuz I got joy out of giving it, and you learn the basic dealing skills casino bosses are going to go way out of their way to further your career.

So, Johnny Lee, the young chinese pit boss who earned my favor by deliberately learning the names of all his lowly pit clerks and just establishing a warm human connection with everybody, told me on my last day there that he would juice me in as a dealer. I was floored. I thought he was joking but he made it clear that he was dead serious.

Sometimes it floors me to think how easy it is to get a job earning $70,000 a year at merely 40 hours a week. It feels surreal, folks, like I'm cheating somehow.

In many circles such talk would be quickly labeled pipe dreams and boyish fantasy. "You think you're just gonna waltz in there and in a year be earning over $60 grand a year as a dealer? HA!”

But, my mom is doing it, my step-dad did it, and I see hundreds of dealers doing it every day here! I mean, you gotta be stupid to shun the job opportunities in Vegas! If you like people and can add to 21, are willing to give excellent customer service and give up holidays, it's a cinch.

Today's Vegas Baby's Birthday...

2007-07-21T11:31:00.000-07:00

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He just turned 26 all over again.

The guys at PC Mechanic set up for Vegas Baby a hearty Happy Birthday thread.

His international lover sent him a QuickCam for international video messaging.

Because of his casino shift he's gonna miss his family's big birthday dinner at an Italian restaurant they have each year cuz several members of his family have birthdays in July. This is common for Vegas families, casino workers often don't celebrate Christmas and such on the proper day due to their inflexible work requirements.

But Vegas Mom called him this morning and wished him a happy birthday and said she'd take him out for sushi next week.

So even though Vegas Baby's still terribly broke, he's rather happy today.

.....................Happy Birthday, Mr. Dealer Extraordinaire..................

OMG, my ADD is gonna drive me crazy! False car alarm....

2007-07-20T10:24:00.000-07:00

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Jeez, I go to work the next day and find my car. Now I have to get Metro, my favorite organization, to clear the car off of the Stolen Vehicles list and turn the damn thing in and somehow pay for it!

Aargh....

Vegas Baby screws himself once again

2007-07-19T08:49:00.000-07:00

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Damn, It's Hot

Crap, either his rental car was stolen or they frickin repoed it! How rude is that?

They called twice today while he was at work, going on about how he was only supposed to have it for 3 days- which was a damn lie.

These new cars have those GPS chips n they may have located it that way. Either way it spelled trouble for Vegas Baby- just what he needed.

He searched the parking garage for several hot, stuffy minutes before concluding it was stolen or repoed. So he walked up to the Flamingo bus stop drenched in sweat with the above 100 degree night air.

He caught the gargantuan Deuce, the double Decker bus that ran up and down the Strip. It was full of tourists and whatnot. He eventually worked his way to the upper level, amazed at the coolness of the air conditioning in this behemoth.

He passed his mother's casino where she makes triple his income which late last year inspired him to starve for a year to earn the same. And it looked like he would indeed starve, well, not literally, since he got free food, as employees in all Vegas casinos do.

But no car, having to move behind his casino, which may mean an apt.with hot air conditioning, and other deprivations came to visit him. Like tonight, he was sick earlier at work and felt very fatigued and worn out. So naturally this would be the night he would have no ride home.

He dreaded the last part of the ride home from the Downtown Transportation Center to his ghetto house. The bus went way out of his neighborhood before it swung back to his area which was usually inhabited by a sundry and varied dark denizens of the night, whose nerve-wracking habit of approaching him for money for sexual favors or drugs or just simple pan-handling he didn't look forward to.

He would have to rely on the kindness of his co-workers for rides to his casino or leave 3 hours early to catch the bus or risk failing probation, until he could move into a new hovel with new rude vagaries he'd have to tolerate. Man, becoming a casino maven sure was taking a toll on his person!

He was exhausted and wanted to lay his head down but this buxom babe in front of him might take offense to his proximity. Besides he needed both hands to type this text into his smartphone. Otherwise, how would his readers hear about the plight of Vegas Baby?

The Deuce belched Vegas Baby out onto the dark, heated concrete of the Downtown Transportation Center and he quickly discovered another late night bus route that will take him directly to his hovel, well, a couple of blocks away anyways. And it leaves in only 15 minutes. So he parks himself on a hot brick wall waiting for the 403 Northbound with all sorts of black people around him. One super-short white girl who is at least in her twenties though she is the size of a 12 year old, walks by him carrying a tiny black chihuahua in her arms.

Vegas Baby is getting thirsty and he's sure he's gonna have to wash his sweat-drenched uniform shirt. A guy is sitting on the brick wall with a bottle of red Gatorade only to remind him of his thirst.

The 403 is nowhere to be seen and it's due to depart in 3 mins. Fuck, the last thing he needs is a canceled bus!

Dammit! He misread the route times and he had already missed the last 403 No. Now he has to take the 208 W at 1031 pm which would make him have to walk at least 15 mins.

Crap- he may as well have walked this whole last leg. His head was starting to hurt. What he would give right now for a cold drink of water.

A fat, bearded black man next to him fanned himself vainly with his hand in a pathetic gesture. Vegas Baby was tired and grouchy and just wanted to get home into his cool bed.

He felt guilty about how cool his room was when he barely paid any rent and the landlord asked him to make it warmer because the electric bill was over $300 last month and he thought it would be a great idea to pay a couple hundred more in rent to compensate especially since his rent has been so very low for the past 7 months. Only problem with that bright idea was he couldn't even pay his normal rent this month. In fact, he was over $700 in the hole. He had no idea how he was gonna cover that. His car payment got covered thanks to the charitable contribution of a good friend, who turned out to be a real mensch.

But not so his cc bill or cable or 6 others on his never-ending list. He felt he was really gonna sink this time....

The bus was only 8 minutes late. A homeless guy was on their that he
recognized. He used to own a motor scooter and would come early on 'stew day' to get extra portions, telling Becky, volunteer worker that it was better than sex.

He gave his seat up for an elderly Philippino woman who thanked him and sat down. He could almost taste the cold water sitting in his fridge.

The bus let him off at Washington and D street. Now, to walk the gauntlet, Vegas baby thinks to himself, as he turned the corner to E street....

...............................Vegas Baby's E street shadow...................

He found E Street to be almost deserted, much better than F Street, which he took the other night. Only one soul came near to crossing his path. He took some pics of the desolate neighborhood.

..............................Ye Ole Cycle Shoppe....................

...................................The Compound at Night..........................

He finally came to the Compound relieved at how fast and uneventful the walk was.

When he got home and fired up his computer he found out that there were more fraudulent transactions that got to his bank account via Second Life. Another fucking $500 + with $198 more in overlimit fees! Omg, when does it ever end?

Then after the police representative came over the next morning and took his stolen car report, he realized that he had canceled his car insurance policy when he found out his car was dead, forgetting that the car rental was covered by this policy....

Vegas Baby sure managed to screw himself this time....

Advice from Vegas Mom

2007-07-15T23:26:00.000-07:00

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For all you prospective dealers out there. Take it from mom, a dealer with 30+ years experience. She opened the Treasure Island, Bellagio, and the super-posh casino, the Manhattan (pseudonym).

She was earning triple my income last summer when she told me that I needed to get a better job.

Here she is in a voicemail.

"Hey,this is your mom. I'm gonna tell you how to keep your job. When you make a mistake at the table, don't fix it yourself, always call the floor. It's an important thing to remember. So that way you're off the hook.

"I know sometimes when you make too many mistakes you don't want to call them over every time, but you just have to do it. So that way no one can say anything bad about you."

What's funny is, I was just thinking the day before she gave me this advice, under what circumstances should I alert my supervisor when I've done one of my many (often ADD-induced) errors.... And believe me, there are many- I could really use my ADD medicine....

The Tattoed Princess Dealer

2007-07-12T11:57:00.000-07:00

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Next, is the Longhorn Casino, home of the only dollar blackjack table in Vegas. Used to be lots of houses that featured dollar tables- hell, the Sahara used to have 7 tables every night of the week just 4 yrs ago. But that is a thing of the past now.

So, in the quaint Longhorn Casino , I secretly evaluate the dealers on the $1 BJ table. And I think to myself, this one will make it... or, oh no, this one will never cut the mustard.... And who comes to deal at my table? Jessica, the quixotic tattooed Princess dealer.

She has these awesome tattoos on her arms, mostly on her left arm with an interesting Asian caricature on the inside of her right forearm.... Very interesting, indeed. After she dealt only 2 hands, I piped up, “Honey, you're in the wrong place...”

She looked at me briefly and continued to deal lightning fast.... Eventually we had a good chat going on. She had only been working there for 5 days. She actually worked for 5 years at the very casino I work in and knew one of my big bosses. Folks, Vegas is a small town if you've been there for more than 5 years.

Jessica took this job at the flea-bitten Longhorn casino after taking a year off to party. Hence, she was concerned that she couldn't pass the chemical substance test. She did, while applying at this rinky-dink casino.

After watching her skills and surmising what she must be making in tips, about 1/3 of what she made at the Imperial Princess and hearing that she also taught table games at the Las Vegas Professional Gaming Academy, I told her to just walk out of this joint. She wouldn't have enough time to find a good dealing job wasting her precious hours at this dive. She mentioned that she was afraid to go to her car at night when she got off and judging by her reaction when I told her to have Security walk her to the car I repeated my suggestion that she leave this job.

I don't know if anything I said was helpful to her but one day I hope to see her dealing at a posh Strip casino. I suppose it will have to be a house that has long sleeved uniforms like we do at the Imperial Princess to cover her quixotic tattoos.

So, here's the Vegas Baby's shout-out to the uber sharp dealer, Jessica: Hey there, girl, you're too hot a dealer to swim with the goldfish, get over here into the shark tank! Believe. Walk tall. And never look back.

Feeling the pain, realizing the hope

2007-07-12T03:32:00.000-07:00

When last I dealt in a casino I was also without a car for a few months. It was miserable.
I lived on W. Charleston and got off at 4 am. The Strip bus stopped running at 2 am until 5 am. I often got off at 2 and would be so tired and hot with no place to go for hours.
The Sierra Circle casino had no breakroom where I could nap or at least hang out.
This time I hope to have a better go at it. I suppose I have to try to move into the dingy-ass apartments behind the Imperial Princess.

*************************************************

So, my Friday is over. I've decided to turn in the rental tomorrow after I renew my driver's license- I really couldn't afford to keep it this long.
Now , I'm feeling it, folks....
I'm broke as hell, I got bills up the ying yang that I can't pay for for the first time since beginning this casino venture. Three weeks ago I spent the last of my savings for the car repair- 14 fucking hundred dollars on my lovely Cadillac which I cannot drive or repair. All I can do with that car is pay off the $5400 I owe on it at 29% interest.
Sigh... It sucks to be poor, folks.
I feel deflated. My neck twitch is all up and running strong, makes me look like an idiot, I'm sure.
But I'm not despondent. I'm hurting that's for sure, but I see a very strong light at the end of this tunnel. It's called a posh dealing job. If I can manage to pass probation and learn pai gow poker and strengthen my roulette I know I can win a position at the Golden Nugget or the MGM Grand and that's without my mother's juice. With it... who knows?
So, it's July- 6 months will be January, then I truly have the chance to make over $60,000/yr! And this is no pipe dream, dealers are doing it EVERY DAY here in Vegas. I got 18 months experience and just have to get the rust out of my roulette and 21 game and pick up pai gow- learning craps would help lot but I don't think I can wrap my ADD brain around that game- hell, I can't even play it. But I got all t ingredients to truly be a dealer extraordinaire. And I aim to do it! Like I told my international lover the other day- nothing is going to stop me.
So, I am screwed on a car loan I gotta repay though I can't drive or repair it- so what?
I mean, what would you do for $60,000/yr? Hell, I would shovel chicken shit for that- Man,I would separate the colors for that much! And what do I have to do for that income? Sleep with the casino manager? Kill someone?
All I gotta do is learn my games, be teachable, be proactive, keep my nose clean and sort of play a game with my customers and make them feel good which I LOVE to do and am good at! And that is all for only 40 hrs/ wk. I don't have to work 60 hrs/wk, don't have to take my job home and be on my computer for 3 hrs/night like some corporate weenie....
Sometimes when I think about it, I feel like I'm cheating somehow.
But t thing is, dealers are doing it by the hundreds EVERY DAY in Vegas.
"Psst, hey buddy! Wanna triple your income?"

Crash On The Freeway

2007-07-10T22:29:00.000-07:00

So there I am coming home from work on I-15 and I see a bunch of car's brake lights coming on so I slow down. Then I notice whilst the cars are almost at a stop on the left the right two lanes are still unclogged. So I change lanes and go by the congestion when on my left I see a car has smashed into the first county freeway truck that has the big arrow flashing to go right.
Out of the corner of my eye I see the silhouette of a man on all fours on the shoulder. I pulled over and got out of the car- it looked like he was injured.

I jog about 60 yards to the scene of the accident and find him sitting on the ground with his back resting on the freeway divider with the freeway truck driver and a girl who is crying. I ask him where it hurts and as I wait for his answer I hear the squeal of brakes and turn to see a speeding car that is trying to get out of the far right lane where his smashed car was. The girl starts to run then stops when the car avoids causing another accident. I turn my attention back to the man who has now stood up but hear another squeal of brakes and turn to see a pickup truck narrowly miss his wrecked car by veering onto the shoulder we were standing on.
I shout to the two car occupants to move further down the freeway and I turn to the driver and ask him if he has any flares. He says they are behind the seat of his truck and for me to get them because he is calling 911.
I run to the truck and can't get behind the seat. Two other drivers from two other trucks come walking up slowly and I wave at them to come over and direct them to get the flares. The lead driver looks at me stupidly and I turn and go back to the first driver and tell him to get the flares and I'll call 911.
So, in a couple minutes the flares go up as I try to get the 911 operator not to put me on fucking hold. WTF is that all about? Jesus Christ, this was an accident waiting to happen and you're gonna fucking put me on hold??? FUCK!
So he tells me they are already responding to the first call from the driver so I hang up and take some pics and see the ambulances and fire trucks coming into view. Don't know why five Highway Patrol cars weren't there like they were when they tried to arrest me three days ago.
I turned to the young man and tell him to get a lawyer, that this is bullshit, it's very unsafe. I told him to make sure he and his girl go to the hospital to get checked out.
Then I make my exit. The situation was under control.
Like most ADDers I may not be able to balance a checkbook or keep my room tidy but I am damn good in an emergency.

Vegas Baby loses his transportation

2007-07-10T11:37:00.001-07:00

.
Omg, it's ruined, I should have burned it months ago....

The mechanic said I ruined the engine when it overheated last week. And I need a new engine.... Which of course will be THOUSANDS of dollars.

I owe $5400 on it....

I got $80 in the bank.... and a $320 fricking car pmt coming out of my paycheck this week.

What the hell am I going to do?

2007-07-08T22:47:00.000-07:00

.

It's not everyday a guy gets guns drawn on him....
.
Dammit! Busted by the Highway Patrol again. Clocked at 89 mph!

Jeez, I need a radar detector, t poor wannabe millionaire thought to himself, prolly-----

(in real time this is when Vegas Baby, while typing this memo on his handy-dandy smartphone, was RUDELY interrupted)

After taking Vegas Baby's driver's license and running it, the Highway Patrolman stepped out of his car. When he saw the cop unstrap his gun he knew he was in for some drama.

Unbeknownst to him, FIVE other cop cars had converged on him.... Out of one of them, another patrolman drew his gun he saw out of the corner of his eye.

As the first cop ordered him out of the car with his hands up and to walk backward he had to cup his hand to his ear cause the cop didn't speak loud enough to overcome the freeway noise. That's when the first shot went off...

JUST KIDDING!!!

The cop merely handcuffed him and placed him in the back of his car. And the other cops gathered round and then began the sifting out of the truth. This is about the fourth time Vegas Baby has been cuffed in the past 7 months.

A former employer, Joey Rubico (his real name, unlike any others in this blog), became a crack fiend-

and used Vegas Baby's name, social security number and age when he got arrested in 2000 for- of all goddamn things, credit card forgery while the hapless wannabe millionaire worked for- you guessed it- a credit card bank! He thought for sure his employer would fire him because of the implications.

Vegas Baby spent 9 frickin days in jail while the authorities sorted his identity out... His bipolar went largely untreated since the jail ass doctor only prescribed him a weak shit mood stabilizer- he could still recall the large white plastic-feeling capsule and its strange taste. His nerves were so shattered he had a hard time remembering how to sign his name for months afterwards.

That adventure also cost his mother $5000 for a lawyer to even begin to work on the case and it still took him a week to get him out.

After a couple more mistaken arrests and multiple handcuffings, the cops found out the felonious sod had a 6 inch scar on his left knee. This became Vegas Baby's way out of going to jail every time a cop ran his name.

On the side of the freeway, one Highway Patrolman examined his knee and said, "I don't see a scar, do you?" Vegas Baby almost laughed outloud at that....

So, the cops uncuffed the future casino maven and told him he should get Metro Police Department to sort this out. Vegas Baby refrained from going through the whole spiel about how he contacted the officer in charge of Record Challenges and was assured that there was a total separation between his crack addicted fomer boss and the future darling of the Las Vegas casino industry....

2007-07-08T22:14:00.000-07:00

Now for the Continuation---

If you haven't read the first post to this blog below, PLEASE DO SO FIRST by clicking here:

Dark and very quiet

It was dark and quiet; very quiet in the house. His hair stood on end as he went from room to room kinda like the cops do in the movies only he was armed with his damned Motorola V276 cellphone- Oh, God, don't let him get started on Verizon Style customer service- not the Smith and Wesson his fingers cried out for.

The house was void of bad guys. Only Curtis who stayed upstairs and Frankie in the room next to his were in the house. He checked for missing items and, by God, they left his computer alone! He did find they took his wine bottles, DVDs and two cans of soup and tuna.

But what would poor Frankie think? His 67 year old paranoid roommate who barely spoke English had been telling him for weeks, while he locked the sliding glass door in broad daylight, “Johnny, this is a veeeery dangerous neighborhood with lots of baaad people! You mustn't leave the door open! It's veeery dangerous!”

Frankie was going to go over the edge in anxiety and panic. This is his worst nightmare come true....

Well, that was the first break-in. Two more were to follow. Those involved his own damned bedroom window being broken and them making a forced entry while he was at work. His Cadillac would be gone so they must have figured it was a good time to invade.

It was hard to free his mind of anxieties whilst sleeping next to the broken window that burglars had just entered hours before. He had to employ making up dumb reasons in his head as to why they wouldn't dare come back so soon after their crime....

The landlords took their time fixing the window. So much time, actually, that the frickin burglars came thru it again just four days later!

That pissed Vegas Baby off. He fumed for hours at work in the posh casino, wondering what the hell the landlords were thinking! Wasn't security important to them? He imagined himself icily interrogating Craig or Rhonda about their criminal negligence. What if Frankie got hurt, physically or emotionally? What were you thinking? This was inexcusable!!!

But, basically, he was a guest there, allowed to stay for hardly any rent money, a fortunate situation indeed. And he was oddly submissive in certain circumstances, a more self-respecting man would have said, the hell with it, and at least confronted them when the window wasn't fixed the next day after the burglary.

CSI Las Vegas, the model for the TV show, actually came out and took pictures of the dusty footprints on his sheets for his bed abutted the wall where the window was. They even got DNA samples from some blood one of the criminals left when he cut himself on the glass. He

Fortunately, the landlords put bars on the windows after several days of dithering about. So now Vegas Baby sleeps in relative safety.

The Second Premier of Vegas Baby- an excerpt from the life of a future casino maven...

2007-07-08T12:05:00.000-07:00

,

.

Damn it all! The poor man cursed to himself.



A wannabe millionaire is stuck at midnight on the Strip trying to get home with a broken down luxury car and barely enough cash to get a bus.... With a negative bank balance thanks to the professionals at Enterprise Rentacar. And he's in debt to the love of his life and his mother and his best friend and still hasn't enough to cover his bills.



And the car- good gawd- the $5500 in-debted broken down curse on 4 wheels. Which is costing him over $700/mo. Which means he has to find some way to get rid of it and its debt and live behind his casino in the dumpy ass apartments which prolly has got hot air-conditioning and live there consigned to his online life IF Linden Labs has fixed his gorram acct!

This fucking sucks.



He can't get on Second Life nor will those sods email him so he can find out wtf is going on with the scammers who hijacked his account.

So goes the plight of Vegas Baby...



The Strip bus, the million dollar double decker behemoth, dubbed The Deuce, by the city pols, dropped him off at the Downtown Transportation Center, and he decided to just hoof it the last 3/4s mile to home. Vegas Baby lives in the dark streets of the other Las Vegas. Which is inhabited by a seamy lot yet with gems of people sprinkled throughout.




A fat, black girl saw him coming down the street and walked over to his side and when he passed said, “Take me home witchu.”

He smiled at her, kept on walking and said, “Sorry, honey. Not tonight.”



A few minutes later a tall, lanky black man came ambling up to him.

“You need a lock? I got a lock for sale.” He said.



Vegas baby wondered if the man could read his mind. He had just been assigned a locker at his new job. “Well, yeah, I do need a lock... how much?”

“Only four bucks....”



“Here...” he dug into his wallet and then stopped, “Oh, I only got a ten.” He said.



“You can get change in there,” the street locksmith said, pointing at a hollowed out casino/bar inhabited by a strange looking crowd.



Beads of sweat formed on Vegas Baby's forehead. He had driven by that joint everyday for months. Without fail, there were hungry-eyed folk staring at him every time he drove by. It's as if every single one of them were wanting something from me, he thought to himself, as their eyes bore into him. Like I got cash for a hooker or for some drugs.... “I'm not going in there....” He mumbled and then walked off.



The impoverished wannabe millionaire shrugged off all of the other man's cries to just enter that dark, foreboding hovel and get change for his sale and walked the last two blocks to his home while chatting up a friendly homeless white guy who matched his pace from across the bar but proved to be genuinely harmless.



The Compound, he often thought of it, with it's locked gates and steel fences, though the house he stayed in only had a fence four feet high. THEY had broken into the Compound three times in one week a couple months ago. Some unknown and decidedly clumsy burglars.



In his previous job as a pit clerk in a swank and huge casino, Vegas Baby didn't get home until 230 am on a good night. One dark, hot summer night, he found the weakly locked gate forced open and the front door ajar.



He paused and collected himself. Pulled out his cell phone and entered 911 and put his finger on the Send button, wishing he had a gun, a big, black, fully loaded semi-automatic piece. He slowly pushed the door open and entered his house, ears straining to hear evidence of the presence of dangerous intruders.


TO BE CONTINUED...