I haven't done anything incredibly stupid in a while...

...was Mike's reasoning for us going to Atlantic City on about 20 minutes notice on Saturday afternoon. It's not like we had anything better to do considering we were probably the only two in our group of friends in the immediate area not invited to one of the two weddings happening this weekend. Also the seed had already been planted since Brian was trying to get me to go for the last few days since the wedding he went to was in Ocean City, NJ, a short drive from AC. Mike pretty much some up the trip in his blog, so I won't rewrite the same story, but I did want to mention something. Bill Simmons has theories on the proper environment for winning at blackjack. I've always subscribed to these theories whole heartedly and Saturday couldn't have been a more perfect example of that.

We sit down at the first table and you immediately feel the bad vibes. Albert the dealer (aka the cooler) obviously hates his job, he is a large man and sweating an awful lot so I can understand why he's not in the best mood. A jovial dealer is important to winning, so Albert is strike one. Strike two would've been the two Asian kids who had no idea what they were doing in the first in the first and second positions. I know that blackjack is mostly luck, but when the players in the first to seats continually make the wrong play you get to directly see the cards that you would've gotten had they played there hand correctly, and that is frustrating because it is almost always the case that they hurt you. Strike three would be that no one seemed to be having any fun at all, I personally was afraid to talk because I didn't want to say the wrong thing that finally pushed Albert over the edge, I would've felt bad. The asian kids were stressing over every bet like it was life or death, that's no way to play, it gets me all worked up when other people are worked up. You're suppossed to get a little thrill from gambling but when you're so nervous over ever bet as if you're losing your life savings and won't be able to pay tuition in the fall or bail your dad out of jail or something you probably shouldn't be gambling that money. Consequently all this led to me losing $200 in less than 25 minutes. We comtemplated leaving at this point, which would've been epic. My worst trip ever was when me and Baha drove 3 hours, lost all of the money we were willing to lose in 45 minutes, then drove 3 hours back. So this would've been a dubious record. So we decided to give it another go at a different table.

This table was the antithesis of the first table. All the factors you need to be have a winning run were there. Xaio and Lissy were the rotating dealers and they loved us. They thought everyone one at the table was funny, they were joking around themselves, and they genuinely wanted everyone to win. This is the way a dealer should be because then everyones happy, and when everyone's happy everyone's tipping. Also the table mood was great. It didn't start out that way, at first it myself, mike, and bachelor party guy getting pissed at the country couple making horrible plays and daggering us. But then we realized that while they had no idea what they were doing they were very nice people and were more than willing to accept instruction. Once they started listening to us they were cleaning up, on a small scale, they started with probably $60 between them and had around $300 together when they decided to leave because they had left a baby in the room by herself for a while and thought it best that they go up and check on her (i agreed with this decision by the way.) That's when things really turned around for me and Mike. The rest of the bachelor party came down to play some cards before going out for the night and they were a great time (as stated in Mike's blog.) Everyone was ripping on each other, even to the point of getting us involved. Everyone was loud, having fun, and winning. The best part being there one friend that yelled "Fuck Yeah" really loudly everyone once in a while when something good happened. He wasn't even playing he was just excited for everyone else. All blackjack tables need a guy like this. Here was the best hand of the night;

Seat 1: Crazy guy from Brooklyn bets $500
Seat 2: Mike bets $15
Seat 3: I bet $15
Seat 4: Bachelor party guy 1 bets $150
Seat 5: Same guy same bet
Seat 6: Bachelor party guy 2 bets $100

Seat one has to stay on his 13 and was not happy about it. Me and Mike both had something in the range of 17 or 18 I don't really remembered. BP guy 1 doubles on both hands and does not get good cards. Seat 6 stays. The dealer is showing a 6, flips over a King, pulls a 10. The whole table including the 3 or 4 people watching goes bananas. It was awesome. So loud and fact that the people at the next table asked us to keep it down and we all laughed at them for being crotchety old farts. And I realize that relaying a specific hand is incredibly boring but the point is that that is what you live for when you're gambling. Me and Mike only won $15 each but were going nuts because everyone else was super pumped.

The moral of the story is that you casinos are there to have fun. When you're loud and boisterous, having as much fun as possible, things will go well (Me and Mike won back all the money we lost and then some) and even if they don't who cares because you'll end up having a great time anyway.

(In hindsight I realize that I did just tell the same story Mike did in his post just leaving out a lot of detail and a adding a little more detail, oh well.)