Hump Night

Hey gang, let me offer my apologies for the lack of sufficient posting lately, but I've got an excuse--I've been working like a Filipino hooker during Fleet Week for the past several days. And although I'm technically 'off' today, I had to spend most of my day doing productive things away from the computer. And being off ain't exactly true, either. I have to work the graveyard shift tonight, so I might get a bit of rest later this evening, but I'll be up and getting ready to head back to the casino by 1:00 am. Unless they call me in earlier like they did last week.

I've been working the 1 pm shift for the past couple of days, and it's good and steady, but having a few hours off and going back to graveyard for the weekend sucks the life out of me. The poker room was nice and steadily busy during the day, and the money was decent. Yesterday I got my envelope of tokes from the freeroll tourney, and for 14 downs, I made a whopping sixty bucks. That works out to $4.28 per hour. Yikes! It's no wonder why every poker dealer in the entire company tries to get out of working that thing. It felt like I was back dealing dice at the Golden Gate--working my ass off and getting slave wages. At least I'll get that extra hunnert-an-fitty added to the paycheck.

Anyhow, yesterday's shift was kinda fun, and moved by pretty quickly. A couple hours before I got done, my gal Randi came by to say hey--I hadn't seen her since New Years. I thought she might be working the poker room that night (she's a cocktail waitress, of course), but no such luck--she had the penny slot section up at the front of the casino, and told me to come on by before I left.

I got out after seven hours, so once I cashed out, signed out, and ditched my ugly shirt, I wandered up to the front of the casino. I found a comfy spot at a five-cent deuces wild video poker machine, and Randi brought me two shots of Captain Morgan with lime slices to pour into my fountain Coke that I'd gotten from Fatburger. I played about fifteen minutes and got four quick wild royals for 120 nickels each time, so I cashed out and split my winnings with her.

But her section was huge, and the penny slots are always busy, so she had to work instead of goofing off chatting with me. And just like me, she's on the Extra Board, so she has to hustle tokes when it's busy, too. I was pretty tired anyways, so I said goodnight and headed out. Dinner was an Asian chicken salad from the Jack in the Box drive-thru. Not bad for like six bucks.

The rest of my evening consisted of nothing interesting, so I went to bed at a decent hour and got plenty of sleep.

I considered spending my entire morning doing nothing but making a pot of coffee and doing some writing, but I had stuff to do. The laundry monster needed slaying, and I had a bundle of small bills that needed to get deposited at the bank so that I could finally close my wallet again. So instead of being lazy and writing poker stories, I got my ass up, took a shower, and headed out.

I ran a few errands--while out I also topped off the gas tank at $1.93--I'm trying to keep it as full as possible until it slip back over two bucks a gallon, and eventually ended up over at the Omelet House sitting at my regular table and sipping on a cup of coffee that somebody else made. It was a slow morning for Marcie, so we got to chat quite a bit between her refilling the coffee cups on her other two tables.

She talked me into trying the stuffed French toast for breakfast, and I went with the apple variety instead of blueberries. Basically, it was two slices of French toast, stuffed with apples, cinnamon, and cream cheese, dusted with powdered sugar and served with bacon and eggs. It was damn good--probably my favorite thing so far that I've ordered so far. And it didn't need butter or syrup, either. I came close, but I couldn't quite finish it. But I lingered a bit taking advantage of the free coffee refills and visiting with one of my favorite gals.

I came home after breakfast, and got my exercise going up and down the stairs all afternoon between my bedroom and the laundry room. I've still got lots more to do, but I've called it quits for now. I've got no plans for tomorrow except for vacuuming, and I'm trying to decide whether or not to ditch the flannel sheets and put on the new 600 thread-count luxury set.

More later...

I've got some stories in the hopper.