Saturday, April 05, 2008

No Fun At the Office

I'm glad the everyone enjoyed yesterday's video--I hope it made your workday go by a little faster.

I'm easing myself back into my routine at the casino, and it's not been too bad. The last two nights I've been on my favorite string of tables, and it's been pretty mellow. Actually, it was a little too mellow last night--around midnight, there were seven dead games in Chinatown, so the shift boss came over and closed them all at once. Ugh. I was hoping they'd do it gradually, because that meant that we were doing 20 minutes on, 20 minutes off for the rest of the night. That sucks. Thinking that we weren't going to make any money having too many dealers and not enough players, and it being my first night back in nine days, I left two hours early.

Of course, as soon as I got back in tonight, I saw that the main pit more than made up for the lost tokes in Chinatown, and we ended up having a $160+ toke day. Doh! Yep, I am an idiot and lost out on about $40 of that. So I promised myself--no more early outs for the rest of the pay period.

So last night, I was chillin' on my favorite games, making a bit of money here and there, laughing it up with my players, when suddenly I got hot and started killing everyone. Before I knew it, my Pai Gow game was dead, and looking around, I saw seven other dead games, too.

Not again! But they kept them open a little longer this time. Anyhow, once they finally closed my game, as I was counting down the bank, I accidentally dropped a couple of checks on the floor. I called out "Check down" and reached down to get it. When I did, I twisted my back that one particular way that wouldn't let me straighten back up again. I was immediately wrecked. So I sat back down in the chair and tried to twist a bit, but it was to no avail. Once my game was closed, I gimped around the pit like an old man who'd forgotten his cane while I emptied the toke boxes that my inconsiderate co-workers didn't do. I swear, I could barely walk.

This happens to me about once a year, sometimes twice, and sometimes a trip to the chiropractor works, sometimes not. Usually I just suffer for a couple of days and then suddenly it's gone and I feel like a million bucks. I can tell that this is a very mild episode, but at the time, it was like getting a sudden charlie-horse in my lower back. Since there was only an hour to go in my shift, and so many games were closing, I immediately broke my promise to myself and asked for an hour early out. They gave it to me, and I slowly shuffled that long beige mile back to my locker and the laundry chute.

Stopping to rest in the dining room, I grabbed a quick bite of breakfast before making that long trek to the parking garage. Surprisingly, the more I walked, the better I felt. So I didn't want to get in my truck, knowing that my back would tighten up again on the drive home. I was right--it did--and watching me trying to get up the steps to the front door once I got home was high comedy for whoever might've been watching, but it was nothing compared to watching me try and get my shoes off a few minutes later.

I just got these new absolutely awesome MBT work shoes, and they lace-up instead of slip-on like my loafers and man-clogs. So trying to get them off when I couldn't move my back was kinda like watching the last half-hour of just about every movie Jim Carrey has ever done. Lots of falling down and rolling around, not really accomplishing much. I finally got them off, swallowed two Aleve tablets, and I'm currently lying out prone, floor-blogging. If it wasn't so windy and chilly outside, I go sit my ass in the hot-tub for an hour or so, but that brisk walk at the end of it all might just do me in for good.

Maybe tomorrow night, instead.

I'm sure I'll feel much better tomorrow. Like I said--I can tell this is just a minor episode. Some sleep and some pain meds, and I'll be just fine.

Anyhow, besides throwing my back out, work was fairly enjoyable tonight. I dealt a lady a Royal Flush on Pai Gow, for a $750 payoff, which was cool. She's one of our nicer players, so it was good to see her win one. At the very same time, I had a complete jerkoff in seat seven pick up his cards and reset his hand after I'd set mine and was doing the payouts for the player in seat two.

I told him he couldn't do that, but he insisted on being an asshole about it, so I called the floorperson over. She flipped his cards over and told him not to touch them, and he started giving her some shiat, too, basically saying to her, "What are you gonna do about it?". So she called Security, and the shift boss over, and they had a word with him.

I went on break right then, so I didn't see the resolution of the whole situation, but when I got back, I saw him sitting at another table, and I saw the new floorperson take his beer away from him and say "You're cut off!". That was priceless, because he damn near blew a gasket at that point, but Security was lurking about, so he just left on his own, without the assistance of zip-ties or pepper spray. But seeing the floorperson yoink his beer pretty much made my night.

Other than that, it was a rather uneventful night at the ol' casino. Very busy early on, but uneventful nonetheless. And my night just flew by. I wish I could've stayed that last hour, but I would've been miserable, especially if I ended up on a pitch game. I think waving the white flag was the best course of action for me.

Hopefully, I'll be feeling better tomorrow, and maybe I'll feel inspired to do some writing. As it stands now, I really have *no* desire to write up a trip-report type of narrative about my March Madness activities last week. I had a fantastic time, but I think I'm going to skip the whole trip report theme this time around. It's a lot of work to write something like that, and since I was never really alone the entire time, all of my activities are going to be covered by everyone else anyways. And I've shared pretty much all the funny quotes over on T2V already, so writing six or seven paragraphs of back story for each one is not appealing to me, either. I'm sorry--I'm just not feeling it right now. It was a very long week, and surprisingly, I don't feel like re-living it just yet. Maybe I will in a few days, but don't hold your breath.

Mikey

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