I Think the Casino Steals More Than Money

Val has a new conspiracy! It's totally in her head, but you are about to get a glimpse, as she peels back some scalp and Dremels out a skull window to let you peep inside.

Last Monday, we got to the casino a little after 11:00 a.m. I stayed with The Pony for the first two slots. We played side by side. Hick was off visiting his pawn shop lady. We had no need to communicate by phone.

At the second slot, I saw a penny under The Pony's stool as I stood up to leave. I got out my phone for a picture. Two. It worked just fine. I left The Pony and went about 50 feet across the casino to play my Wonder 4 Tall Fortunes slot.

I had just sat down there when I heard my phone. I didn't know if it was a text or an email. I can't feel the vibration when it's in the side pocket of my gambling purse. When I looked, it was an email from Caesar's Rewards, saying I had limited time to reserve my next stay. That was in the subject line. I didn't open it. Just looked at the email page 

 

Caesaar's Rewards 

[FINAL HOURS] You Have Limited Tim... 

Reserve your next stay. GO MOBILE DOW...

The email came in at 11:36. I closed the gmail app and put the phone back in my purse. Didn't think anything more about it. Until later.

I didn't use my phone again until an hour later, except to check the time. When I hit my bonus later, before lunch, I took out my phone to take a picture. Nope! My phone shut itself off. Tried to restart. Shut off. Restart. It went on and on while my bonus played out! Lucky for me, The Pony was at Heidi's Beerhaus (the slot), and could see me, and came over to watch. He took my pictures for me.

Okay. So my phone has locked up like that before, when trying to take a picture. I went in and deleted a bunch of pictures back then, and it worked again after a hard reset. I tried that this time, but still my phone was acting up. Acting up, in fact, into the next day, after charging, and after more picture deletions and a couple more hard resets. Then it magically started working again two days after our casino visit.

BUT THAT'S NOT ALL!

When Hick went out to get A-CAD when we were ready to leave, he noticed that the thingy that lets his phone come in on the radio was not working.

"Pony. Take a look at this. It's shut itself off. I need to get it connected again so I don't have to get out my phone while I'm driving." [YES!]

"Last time it did that, I think you had turned off your [bluetooth?]. Give me your phone. There. It was still on. But I turned it off and on."

"Huh. It's still not working."

"I don't know what's going on. I can't fix it from back here. We'll have to try at home, but I don't know what else I can do for it."

So we headed on up the highway, at 75 mph, with Hick getting out his phone to look at it every time he got a text. UNTIL we'd gone almost 60 miles, and turned off the highway onto two-lane blacktop, when it magically started working again about five miles down that road!

I'm not some technology genius. I'm not even a technology simpleton. I'm a technology ignoramus. But something is fishy here! I think the casino was messing with our phones! How odd to get an email about making reservations through Caesar's Rewards (?) within 30 minutes of walking into a casino (that is not a part of Caesar's, as far as I know). Besides, I don't even have Caesar's Rewards.

The Pony didn't have anything go wrong with his phone. That he mentioned. I didn't ask. Maybe he has some fancy setting we don't know about!

Anyhoo... that's my new conspiracy. The casino is mining data out of our cell phones! Maybe changing some of our settings.

Yes. It's far-fetched. That's why it's a conspiracy. You gotta admit, it's not every day that 2 out of 3 Thevictorians have their cell phone go on the fritz during a casino visit, then start working again upon getting away from the casino.