Tag: gambling

For once, I agree with the Mayor

~ dannyhong ~ Leave a comment

In short: the idea of an Atlanta casino has been planted, but Atlanta Mayor Kasim Reed is reluctant about it, in spite of differing, majority opinion.

I’ve already said that I am on the side of the fence that is against the idea of an MGM casino in Atlanta. I’m actually kind of surprised that that opinion is kind of echoed by what the mayor feels about it:

“I’m not there on gaming at all. I believe Las Vegas is in Las Vegas for a reason,” the mayor said. “I just have real issues setting a facility in Atlanta where working folks get off work and walk into a gaming casino.”

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Watching sports is worse than gambling

~ dannyhong ~ Leave a comment

Roulette is considered to be the game with the worst odds in the casino.  Contrarily, it also has the highest payout, for a direct hit.  Ignoring side bets, half, quarter, row and column bets, it’s basically a game where you have a 1-in-38 (37 on European tables with no double zero) chance of hitting a single number.  However, if you ever do manage to hit that number, you get paid 36 times for every chip you have on that sole number.

A few times, I have grinded out enough table time to have been privileged to have hit 17 on the wheel while I’ve had a chip(s) sitting on it on the board.  It’s truly a phenomenal feeling when you hit your number, multiplied by how many chips you have touching it, because it’s a massive payout, especially when your chip denominations are higher than just a dollar.

Among my degenerate gambling friends, I still recall the story of one particular magical night where my brother and I literally spent eight hours in front of the same roulette table, where we hit our magic number 17 at least five times.  I had risked a grand total of $200 of my own money, and walked away with numerous times more than that.  I paid off the remaining balance on my car, and had comped Vegas rooms for nearly two years.

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Good enough to have fooled Vegas

~ dannyhong ~ Leave a comment

Just when it seemed like I had nothing to write about today, the outlet known as “life” gave me something that might seem remotely interesting to at least one or two of my six readers.

I have a tendency to sit on cash sometimes.  Sometimes it’s because no reason other than I simply don’t want to take the time to go a bank or ATM to deposit it, other times it’s like a mental challenge; like if I can operate my regularly scheduled life without X dollars in my account, I can always fall back onto this cash as something of a safety net.

Regardless, I spent a little bit of money that warranted me deciding to put the cash back into my bank account to cover for some of the expenditures, grant a little bit of breathing room and give me a little bit of peace of mind.  So I went to an ATM to deposit the cash, and a hundred dollar bill kept getting spit out by the ATM.  I tried it three times, to no avail.  My skepticism was immediately piqued at that point, but there was also the remote possibility that it was ATM sensitivity.

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The weekend of productivity

~ dannyhong ~ Leave a comment

Since the start of the new year, I haven’t really done much. Just about every weekend has been spent at home, where I ultimately have done nothing but play a lot of League of Legends. Now it’s not that I don’t enjoy the game immensely, but the bottom line was that I was not being very productive with my weekend spare time, and I think it began to creep into my head that I was really wasting a lot of time.

Wasting time is one of my biggest pet peeves, and you really haven’t seen me get bent out of shape until you see me when I start feeling like my time is being wasted; especially when it’s by circumstances caused by someone/something other than myself.

Long story short, I challenged myself to get off my ass and actually do something this weekend. At any given time, I’ve always got a project or three that I want to do, but have always sat on my hands and done nothing, until I felt they were warm enough to start spamming QWER keys and right clicking on LoL. So basically I said to myself to simply fucking do something this weekend.

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The time I felt like Rain Man

~ dannyhong ~ Leave a comment

It’s been a little while since I’ve been back from Vegas, but a combination of getting sick, prioritizing getting photos processed and out the door, and simply catching up with post-holiday/vacation life, I simply neglected to write about it. But aside from the Pedro Griffin trolling story, there was another time at the blackjack tables, where I felt awesome, and remembered a story that I wanted to write about but forgot to, so better late than never.

As is often the case with a Vegas trip, this past one was just the same in the fact that I could have actually made it home having made money – if it weren’t for that last day. It’s pretty typical for me that it’s the last day in which Vegas not only catches up with me, but manages to make sure that I don’t leave with all of the money I brought in which to play with, and this last trip was no exception to that rule. I had been gambling shrewdly up until the last day, and it was naturally on the last night, in which I watched the house money diminish, and then some of my own money subsequently. Regardless, it’s not a big deal, because it’s money that’s accumulated for such frivolous purposes, and it doesn’t affect my bottom line or any financial responsibilities otherwise.

Anyway, aside from Pedro night, it was the night prior in which I was having a particularly good time at a table, and managed to walk away with a little bit of a cherry on top. I was gambling at Paris, where I was pleased to have found a single-deck table that also was being dealt by one of the sexy lingerie-clad dealers that seems to be the fortuitous norm for the Planet Hollywood/Paris/Bally’s troika of casinos these days.

Regardless, as aesthetically pleasing as the view is, being the gentleman I always pretend to be, I’m not one to creep on or unabashedly flirt with and hit on the sexy-clad dealers, because I’m sure they get it enough, and I have no game anyway. To no surprise, such a mentality typically warms most of them up to me, because I’m not such an obvious sleaze, and ultimately my goal is play blackjack, not get reamed, and get as many free drinks as I can in the process; the view is just a bonus.

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Thoughts about Vegas and Otakon Vegas

~ dannyhong ~ Leave a comment

I’m not entirely sure how it happened, but somewhere along the line, I caught something and I’ve been home sick for the last two days.  I do not get sick very often, so needless to say this doesn’t please me in the least bit, but there’s nothing I can really do about it.  However, it’s given me a little bit of extra time to catch up on processing some of the photos I took while out in Vegas, as well as some time to do some writing.

It’s been like two years since I was in Vegas last, and it’s safe to say that there have been quite some numerous changes since then.  One of the conversations had during the trip was about how Vegas was obviously one of the larger casualties of the last economic massacre, and it’s in little things that I think I notice that such an assessment is true.  A few years ago, casinos were extremely generous with coupon books boasting all sorts of match-play tickets, buy-one-get-one tickets, and other offers to stimulate parting money from your hand to the hands of the casinos.  Typically, these were given upon check in to hotels, or upon registering with a different player’s reward program.

Two years of inactivity and returning to Vegas used to warrant some sort of offers to help make up for money of mine they haven’t been getting but neither redeeming new cards, or checking into the hotel prompted any sort of offers of sort.  To me, it’s not a big deal, since I hardly used anything other than BOGO drinks, but the lack of offers wasn’t lost on me either.

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This guy exists and he trolled me in Vegas

~ dannyhong ~ Leave a comment

Yes I know it’s in German, but it’s not like the context can’t be derived from just watching it, or most people have already seen it and know what I’m talking about but I’m still giving visual representation.

I’m sitting at a single deck blackjack table at the Paris casino, with a beautiful girl clad in lingerie dealing me cards. The two people at the table with me are jobbing like Kaientai, but I’m faring pretty well for myself. Moments later, a Hispanic man; we’ll call him Pedro Griffin, takes third base, and our table is now four.

On the very first hand, sexy Inna is showing a 4, which means that most people typically would consider standing where they are, unless their cards are equal or less than 11, to which they would take a hit to try and get even closer to 21. A 4 showing means that the dealer has to hit no matter what they flip, and since in the game of blackjack, the player typically assumes the unseen card is always a 10, meaning with a 4, they have a 14, meaning they’re one hit away from busting and leading to a win with all players.

“HEET MEE,” says Pedro, when sexy Inna asks him what he wants to do on his turn. Pedro has a 13, and a hit puts him at risk of busting. Sexy Inna pauses with a confused look on her face, and points at her 4. The two people at the table with me groan that someone unenlightened to “the book” is at the table. And I’m staring at Pedro, pantomiming to wave it off and to stand.

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