Binions Technicolor Dream

Okay, so I went through with the one-night vacation down on Fremont Street after researching those hotel prices down there for last Thursday night. I had worked 10 days out of the previous 11, and almost every one of those shifts sucked....to put it bluntly.

For the past 6 months or so I've thrown around the idea of taking a night off and staying downtown for the simple fact that I LOVE the microbrews at Main Street Station and I hate having to worry about designated drivers, etc. I almost went through with this idea a few months ago when I found the Plaza (right next to Main Street Station) at $25 for a night during a slow time. But I never followed through.

I knew Thursday night would be a work-night for Danielle, but she was happy to join me for a portion (turned out to be a very small portion) of the night. I got up at my usual time on Thursday but was VERY lazy, so I didn't really get around and head downtown until about 5pm....right into the rush hour traffic! Oh well, I wasn't in any real hurry since Danielle wouldn't get down there until much later.

I checked into Binions (confirmed at $16.65) and the front desk person told me she'd upgrade me to a "petite suit". I wasn't too sure what that meant, but I tossed her $5 for the effort. The room wasn't too bad. It was worn in spots but it was a good sized room with a table/chairs/couch/coffee maker and a fridge, which was a nice bonus that I think only came in the "petite suit".

While waiting for Danielle, I walked around Fremont Street for a while but, of course, ended up at Main Street Station playing low-limit video poker and enjoying some comped microbrews, which they deliver to the machines and table games. The casino I work at only serves crappy domestic beers at the machines/tables, so I felt like I was being spoiled a little bit!

Before Danielle got downtown, I wanted to make the walk way down past the El Cortez and check out the Western. There was a pretty extensive thread at T2V about the place and I wanted to see what was up there since my last visit well over a year ago. It hasn't changed much. The general atmosphere of desperation and bottom-dwellers was present. The price of a draft beer has skyrocketed from $1 to $1.25 which is not bad for a plastic cup of Coors Original, a banquet beer! There were exactly 4 blackjack tables in the one and only table games pit. Two were open, both $3 shoe games, and both were completely empty! Perhaps the Western is driving away business by only offering these high-rolling $3 tables! I didn't stick around very long at the Western and I'm glad I didn't try to talk Danielle into going down there with me. It's not a very prim and proper place and I'm glad to have made use of the waining daylight on my solo walk back to the canopy.

Once Danielle made it down there, we headed right back to Main Street Station and had dinner at the Brew Pub. I went with the nachos while Danielle chose some sushi. A sidenote.....it just took me about 5 minutes to remember what we both had to eat. That foreshadows the state of mind that I was already in at the time and the haziness of things to come. There was an "incident" with a jalepeno pepper making its way onto one of Danielle's sushi pieces, which I made up for a little later in the night with the gift of a stuffed animal!

To be honest, I can't really remember a lot of what happened after dinner. I think we played some video poker for a while as I downed a couple more microbrews. Then we went out to take in the sights of the Fremont Street Experience. While walking around we saw some stuffed monkeys hanging from one of the stands in the middle of Fremont Street and I made a quick remark about being glad there weren't any Steeler monkeys up there. I think the attendant heard me say that and immediately pounced on it by pointing right to a happy hanging Steeler monkey around the corner from where we were standing. Crap, I guess the laws of boyfriends warranted me buying it no matter what the price, which turned out to be not-so-bad.

Not long after this, Danielle hit the sack since she had to get up around 7:30am the next morning to go to work. This is the very beginning of when things got really hazy! I remember wandering through almost every downtown casino in a vain attempt to find a full-pay jacks-or-better video poker machine. I ended up back at Main Street Station (for the third time that night) since that seems to be the only damn place that has full-pay machines (at the bar of all places).

After a while I got it in my head that I wanted to walk back down to the El Cortez to play some Pai Gow. When I got there, the Pai Gow table was completely full and I also realized that I was running very low on cash. After paying in cash the tip to the front desk person, a couple beers at Main Street, the Steeler Monkey, dinner, etc., I hit the ATM at the El Cortez, which is normally a death sentence! Before I knew it, I bought in for a hundy at the $3 craps table and proceeded to do my best impression of a Elco flea! The Coronas were coming very quickly and the table was never really cold the entire time I was there. Unfortunately, my main strategy was just starting at $3 on the six and eight and maybe a pass-line with $5 or $10 odds. It's not the cheapest strategy in the world, but I power pressed the six and eight the first two times each hit, so I'd usually have $12 on them after a few rolls.

At one point, the table got incredibly hot, but I had to take a whiz like crazy so I just told the dealer to "same bet me" until I got back. When I returned, she handed me like $80 in red chips, which confounded me. Apparantly I had some hardway bets up there that I didn't know I had, so I just told her to keep half of whatever she was giving me. In my state-of-mind, that seemed to be the right thing to do! I also remember power pressing the six and eight a few times and just putting the change on dealer hardway bets. After about 3 hours, the dealer money that they were stacking up in the middle of the table had to be well over a hundred bucks and, unfortunately, I knew it was ALL from me since nobody else was showing any love for those hardworking dealers.

Once the last person aside from myself called it a "night", I rolled a couple more times and colored up with a $160 profit. It wasn't a big profit, but considering I wasn't making too many bets to begin with and much of my $ went to the dealers, it was a very good run! It was also a blast!!! I can't remember the last time I had that much fun at a craps table.

Then came a very bad realization. I walked out on the street and, sure enough, the sun was out (God's flashlight). Joggers were running by....looking at me....and they knew. So then I did something that I will forever regret. I became that of which I hate! I walked straight into Fitzgeralds and sat down at the lone empty seat at the $2 blackjack table! I really don't remember much about my time at the Fitz except for bits and pieces, which include trying to give my beer away without any takers, trying to get a new players card and get rated at the $2 bj table, etc. I was a mess! However, I broke even at the high-roller table and waddled all the way over to the California to partake in their great graveyard specials. One problem.....it was 7am! I somehow made it into the cafe and I think I just went right to the breakfast buffet, but I might have looked at a menu. I'm not really sure. For some reason, I had a problem with the cashier not being able to use the 40 cents I had on my players card to help pay for the meal and I can't really remember paying at all (I hope I didn't just walk the f**k out of there). At any rate, I walked back out directly into the sun again and that's when Danielle called. I told her I was on my way back to Binions and crashed into the room around 7:50am, just in time for her to go to work.

She kindly called the front desk and left a wake-up call for me for 11:30am since checkout was noon. Unfortunately, I found myself up at around 10am with a medical emergency. I'll spare you some of the details, but suffice to say, I had some cleaning up to do in and around the bathroom area for the next 40 minutes or so! I mean the WHOLE area: bathroom door with its full length mirror, bathroom floor, bathroom sink, bathroom toilet, and perhaps other places that I never discovered! I remember using an entire roll of toilet paper and a bath towel during the cleanup, and then back to bed.

I woke up at the wake-up call and somehow made it down to the front desk in time to check out. I left a ten-spot and an apology letter for the housekeeping staff since I think I left about 5% of the mess behind. The will just wasn't there to do more cleaning once I woke up. I know I'm an ass for that, but at that point, circumstances were out of my control.

Friday was spent recovering. I really needed to blow off some steam, and I accomplished that task! Oh, and I somehow managed to profit a few bucks through the whole ordeal!

Here are a few pics. You'll notice they are completely random and not very numerous. I think the last thing on my mind was taking pictures for a coherent blog posting!

I guess this is what a recession looks like on Fremont Street.

Then again, the recession has given the Fitz a reason to turn their noses up on all of those crazy casinos offering the high-rolling $3 blackjack tables!

No rhyme or reason at all for this picture. I have no idea what I found so interesting about this video poker flush.

Here's the Western's massive table games area. Yes, that dealer is actually waving at me to NOT take a picture. I played the roll of a dumb tourist and actually tried to strike up a conversation with her until I realized that English is not her strong suit.

And here's the outside of the "Stern Otel"

Okay, I actually found a video poker machine that took ONLY quarters at the California. I mean that literally. You CAN NOT buy in on those machines with currency. You have to get change at the machine like in an arcade and feed in the quarters on EVERY SPIN! It was novel enough to take a picture I guess, but after 15 minutes my hands were filthy!

Meet Danielle's new friend, who she quickly named Steeley Dan.