Val's Theory of Winningtivity

Hick and I didn't fare too poorly on his guilt trip to the casino Tuesday. We didn't leave BIG winners, but we both left with money. At this venue, that's almost a miracle.

We played slots for 50 minutes before meeting for our half-pound hot dog feast. Let's emphasize that Hick played for 50 minutes. I spent about ten minutes walking to and from the bathroom. I got off to a bad start, but just before heading back up front for lunch, I sat down at a Fu Dao Le slot. It's the one with the giggling babies that come out just before a bonus. Well. I didn't get the giggling babies, but I got a bonus! On the 5th spin! I hit the three green disc thingies on the middle reels. My bonus paid me $70. I took it and ran. Ran to a Buffalo Stampede slot, which was on the way to Burger Brothers. I only had about five minutes to play, which was unfortunate, because I was sure that Buffalo was going to pay me if I'd only kept playing.

After lunch, I had another 90 minutes of playing time. I wandered through the quarter three-reel slots. They didn't pay me. I tried a new slot for me, Power Strike. I'd call that one a draw. I was only betting 30 cents. That's HICK money! I went on toward the back, to one of my favorites, Dancing Drums. I must say, I spent entirely too much time there, and inserted too much money, at 88 cents a spin. That's the minimum. It usually gives me a bonus. Not this time. People came and went at the other two Dancing Drums at my kiosk. I didn't hear them hit a bonus, either. Time was running out. I only had twenty minutes left before I needed to start up front to meet Hick. I was kind of annoyed with Dancing Drums. I was going to make them dance, by cracky!

I thought of taking out my player's card. Sometimes that changes my luck. But I left it. I fed that slot a twenty, and hit the 2X button on the bet. That was $1.76 a spin. The reels spun, and BONG BONG BONG! I hit the bonus! What an extraordinary stroke of good luck. Not only to hit it, but to have a 2X bet in, which would make the payoff better!

I snuck a picture for you, of the total after my bonus. That's $122.60. Not so much snuck, as blatantly took it. I tried several times while the bonus was counting up, but it was blurred. I was lucky to get this one. I figured the rowdy folks at the gaming table directly behind me had the attention of the eye in the sky. Besides, I've never been accosted for taking a picture in this casino.

You can bet (heh, heh, see what I did there?) that I cashed that ticket and ran. Okay. I fed in my $70 ticket, and cashed out the new total, and hobbled across the aisle to another game I'd never played, to kill the last minutes of my casino time. Don't even think that I considered walking up front with time left!

This new game was also an Asian theme, and spit video coins up top every so often. I was playing the minimum of 60 cents per spin. It was kind of fun, but I had no sound on my machine. Oh, not to worry, because a rotund man sat down at the middle machine, to my right, and his wife took the one on the other side of him, and BOTH of their machines had sound. MAX sound. They seemed to be winning up a storm, but I figured mine would have been making those noises, too, every time I hit a little win. That machine wouldn't let me play my twenty down to nothing. In fact, it kept going up, and even when I'd decide to cash out the next time my total went down to a value ending in 5 or 0, it kept winning. I finally hit what I declared was my last spin, and won the progressive bonus of $24 and change. So I cashed out. I mean put in my other ticket, so it was all on one, and headed up front.

Here's what I left with:

That's taken from the top of the toilet paper holder in the women's bathroom. They're always very clean! Before posting it, I had to Paint out the bar code. We don't want somebody printing one off the internet, making their own voucher, and trying to scam the casino! I don't know how they came up with that time stamp, because I know for a fact that this picture was taken at 2:29 p.m. central daylight time! I was very conscious of the time, since we were supposed to leave at 2:30. Of course, that's not all profit, because I had to put in some money to win it. But my casino bankroll is bursting with good health.

Hick lost $8 for the day, and he was ecstatic! That works out to only losing $2.83 per hour! He'll make it back when he sells the Goodwill purchases he made on the trip home.
More on that tomorrow.