A Saturday Night Out With Thevictorians

Saturday night, Hick and I went to the casino. Hick wanted to go. Not that I was going to refuse! We are not Saturday night casino people. We go at off hours, in the daytime. But Hick wanted this time because of the grand prize drawing. It was a $15,000 home makeover from Menards. OR $10,000 in cash.

"Are you sure you want to go? The drawing isn't until 11:00. Then we have to drive home. It won't bother ME, because I'm up at that time anyway. But you're not used to it. We won't get back until almost 1:00."

"I'll be fine. I want a chance at that drawing."

"We're not going to win."

"I never thought you'd win that $100 drawing, either!"

"Oh, so the pressure is all on ME to win!"

"Nah. I have three chances. And we'll probably earn more while we're there."

So...off we went, Hick with his three chances, and me with my four. There were other drawings, one or two per hour, from 6:00 to 11:00. Even with a stop at Goodwill, and to get gas in A-Cad, we arrived by 5:45. Of course there was a bigger crowd than we find on Monday afternoons.

The first order of Hick's business was to go directly to the bin, to deposit our chances in the drawing. They were on little papers, like receipts. We'd only been twice (!) this month, and the first time nobody gave us our chances, even though they were given out every day in June. One per day, and more, depending on how much you played. The instructions were to bring them back on Saturday, the last day of the month, to enter the drawing.

Hick was all excited to put in his chances. Until he got behind a guy who was putting in HIS chances. He had a brown paper grocery sack full of them, tossing in handfuls at a time. I was wishing Hick would turn around, so I could give him my I TOLD YOU SO look. But he didn't. We finally put in our chances, and Hick said, "That's just crazy! There's no way we can win if people do that!"

"I know. But think how much money he had to spend to get that many tickets. He could have paid for his own home makeover, and had a sure thing."

When they started announcing the other prizes, I was not impressed. An air fryer. A $100 gift card for Menards. A deep freeze. $100 cash. $500 cash. Okay, the $500 cash was worth it. But the others...not worth it to me, to be there crammed in with all those annoying gamblers. Who took up the machines I wanted to play. Hick, not so much, because he just sits down at one and puts his money in. He doesn't care if it's a slot he knows, or how to play it. I have my favorites, and when I don't get them, I'd just as soon leave. Really.

Anyhoo...we headed for the buffet right after the first drawing. It cost more because it was steak and prime rib night. As we were ordering, the guy asked if we wanted to check our points, to see if we had some to comp the meal. Here's the thing. The last time we did that, Hick complained that his point total went down. THIS time, Hick had $3 and change that he could have used for the meal, but he said no. My card had $11 worth of meal money. I hadn't used mine last time. I prefer to take it back as cash, and gamble with it. But Hick said quickly, "Yeah, we'll use that one." SEE WHAT HE DID? Hick used my comp money to pay for part of our meal. But not his. He's a sly one, Mr. Hick.

The buffet was tasty. I particularly enjoyed the fish. I don't know what kind of fish it was, but it had a cornmeal batter. The orange chicken actually had chicken in it this time. I made an excruciating faux pas at the fried chicken station. What I thought was a thigh turned out to be some kind of freakish almost-breast, like a hank of white meat on ribs. So I guess I had mostly a back portion. Which was dry. I also had some of the brisket, which was tender and flavorful. No big tray of cake to go under my ice cream this time. But I would rate the meal a success.

We hurried back into the casino for the 7:00 drawing. Let the record show that we did not win. Anything. All night. I lost a bundle, and Hick played for 4 hours on $60. That's incredible! He's much thriftier when he spends his OWN money.

I'm guessing it was the guy with the paper sack of entries who won the Menards Makeover. Hick said a lady sitting by him said, "That guy wins every drawing they have here."

Horror of horrors...when we were waiting in line to get into the buffet, Hick pointed out a sign on the desk that said the buffet would be closed on Mondays and Tuesdays, starting in July! I don't know what we'll do now. We like Old People Mondays, because it's easy to get on the machines we like. However, part of the draw is eating at the buffet, with our $10 each Old People Food Credit.

I guess we'll have to eat somewhere else, or go on a different day and pay full price for food. Such a terrible problem to have.