More Decadence For Two Birthdays

Here are the bags we had for a one-night stay in Atlantic City:



I do not look forward to packing for a longer vacaction. Anyway, the bags are a minor detail. The big deal here is that I now want to be a gambler when I grow up. I don't like the idea of putting money into a machine and getting nothing back. I DO, however, like the idea of putting down a random chip on a number and watching a marble fall into a slot on the wheel with the same number and winning enough money to cover the day and a half of blurry fun times I just lived. Oh, yes, it was that kind of weekend.

The Borgata is very pretty. On the way in, I was excited not only by its beauty but also by the sign that clearly showed No Babies Allowed. I was let down by the amount of strollers and children I bumped into while going through the casinos, though. Seriously? Didn't they see that Full House episode? The girls don't get to keep the money they win because they're not adults!

When SMM and AF arrived, we headed over to the Taj to meet up with AF's friends to gamble. We all stopped at the roulette table. After SMM jokingly referred to Eddie as his dad, the dealer started calling him dad, too. Dad, place your bet. Dad, what's your bet? Dad. Dad. Dad. Pretty funny. Also funny? When Eddie walked away from the table after losing and the dealer holding up his fingers in an L in front of his forehead. Really. We liked the dealer, anyway, because he was helpful, didn't get into a huff when someone did something wrong like touching the chips before he moved the marker, and he gave me and Eddie a lucky 50 cent coin for no reason. How it was lucky, I didn't know since we didn't win one number (though AF's friend did).

While we waited for the roulette excitement to wear off, a scrappy bald gamblin' man with a slight limp who was about my height came scuffling by, dragging his jacket, eyeing me and Eddie up and down. When he got past us, he turned around, pointed, and shouted, You are a beautiful couple! Beautiful couple! Bless you! Ahh, crazy casino man gave us his blessing!!!! It felt as if we'd renewed our vows.

Eddie found a blackjack table and we played a while there. "We" here means Eddie played and I stood behind him, trying to understand what was going on. I know how to play the basic blackjack game, but the counting is really fast and some of the betting confuses me. I also don't know the "rules" of when you should hit and when you should stay. The good thing about the game is that the dealers and the pit boss all help you. They tell you what the "rules" are. I continued to watch, though, because I didn't want old people yelling at me for screwing up the table. In poker, I don't care if players get mad--you are allowed to take risks because they can pay off in your favor and the other players are your opponent. In blackjack, all the players are on the same side against the dealer and I like that we all cheer for each other, so I don't want to screw other people over with silly, risky moves that I don't quite understand.

To take a break from the tables, Eddie and I played a penny slot (and THIS is why pennies are important!). I put in ten dollars. I pushed a button. I won somehow. I was up 40 cents! That's 40 pennies! Then I pushed buttons. I pushed more buttons. A lot of lights flashed. A lot of noises erupted. Eddie kept saying he didn't understand what was going on. I didn't either. A fish kept appearing whenever I won. A cartoon blonde woman with big boobies popped up whenever I lost. The cartoon man in swim trunks riding an inner tube popped up randomly.

I pressed the screen to read the rules. I am a geek. After reading the rules, we still had no idea what the hell was going on. It went this way until I ran out of ten dollars in pennies. So that was fun.

We went back to the room at the Borgata with SMM and AF to get ready for dinner. And this is where things get fuzzy because I was having pre-dinner drinks with myself because no one else was having pre-dinner drinks. I figured we weren't driving anywhere so we could get a little loose. However, I'd forgotten that I have no tolerance left at all, so a drink and a half and I was taking pictures of the view from our room that turned out like this:



And so, we went to dinner. Which is a blur. Apparently, I ate something and so did everyone else. That's what dinner is.

Then we went to the club MurMur. Eddie's request was that I wear a dress. So I wore a dress. Of course, all of my dresses, like most of my club shirts, are boob dresses, so much like the cartoon blonde boobie woman, I had a fair amount of cleavage (come to think of it, I also had a fair amount of cleavage showing in the shirt I was wearing in the casino, so maybe that's just how all my tops are). So we played the game How Many People Are Looking At My Boobs When They Pass By While Pretending Not To Look. It's a fun game. Or it was until we got on the line for the club. We were standing on a line like one in an amusement park; it wound around so that we were next to the people ahead of us. I noticed to guys looking at me and clearly talking about me. Eddie did not notice this. I decided the best route to take would be to ignore them so as the guy turned directly at me to stay something, I turned directly to the right and walked off into a corner and at that exact moment the line moved, but not before I heard Eddie say, What the hell?

I turned around as the guys vanished and pulled on Eddie and was like, That was fun! He was like, That guy tried to grab you. I was like, no he didn't. Now, I of course couldn't see what was happening, so this could have been the case, but I was adamant that it didn't happen. I answered instead, Yeah, he was looking at me before. Eddie was like, I'm WITH you like right HERE. I was like, I know but that's what happens when I wear dresses! He was like, I know you get hit on but it shouldn't happen when I'm WITH you. Really, I don't think the guy was going to hit on me. In retrospect, I remembered I was wearing a necklace that has a charm that looks like a spacer for a 45 record, and I get comments about it from time to time. That means that the guy was probably looking at my chest and then saw my necklace and was going to ask about it, but still, it was all about the necklace, and that's why he was probably trying to get my attention.

Anyway, we got into the club without further incident and that's when I saw something I've never seen before. I've seen a lot of clubs and a lot of dance floors. Never have I seen a group of guys standing in a circle dancing. I've seen hip hop circles and I know that battles on the dance floor happen, but this was different. This was a circle of guys dancing the way a circle of girls dances around their purses. It was quite amusing.

The night continued to get amusing with a packed dance floor that Eddie and I lasted on for about twenty minutes. We then went up to the side as AF and her friends danced and fought off weird pushy people. At about 2:30, we decided to ditch the club and gamble. First, we went in search of a bottle of water. That took about half an hour as we walked in circles around the casino, attempting to find the cafeteria. I could barely walk by the time we found it, but I was happy that we found a Ben and Jerry's and I was able to try Stephen Colbert's Americone Dream and then settled for Lemonade Sorbet. Mmmmmmm.



Then we changed and went to gamble again. More blackjack. We sat next to a very young engaged couple. The guy told me I should gamble the way his fiancee was, but I said I was fine watching and learning and not losing money. Eddie did pretty well and we headed to sleep at around 3 something.

The next day, Eddie, AF, and I were up at like 7:30 and SMM was dying to sleep more. The three of us headed to breakfast and then to blackjack. SMM met up with us about an hour later. That's when I noticed the cocktail waitress still walking around, and I thought, Huh, it's way to early for that amount of cleavage. Her boobs were up to her chin. It was amazing.

One of the lessons I learned is that Atlantic City has a lot of cleavage, and it's very easy to fall into the pattern of showing it off among other things:




We, meaning Eddie, did okay with the table again, and then it was already time to check out. We gathered our stuff and headed to the roulette tables on the way out. We wanted to play one more number before we left. So Eddie took his small winnings and chose a few numbers. I stood by the side with the bags. Then SMM said something like WOW and then we realized that Eddie's number hit. I kept asking what happened what happened because I couldn't see the table. In the frenzy, the dealer carded me--heeheeheeeee----me, AF, and SMM got carded and when Eddie gave her his, she didn't even look at it and was like, you're good. So then I asked again, Did he win? And they were like, Oh yes he did.

And that's how we wound up having a practically free weekend in AC. And you know what was in my pocket? The lucky 50 cent piece. So there! It does work!