Reno: Cash me out

Money won is twice as sweet as money earned.  ~From the movie The Color of Money

It's time to cash in the chips on our little vacation, luckily there were chips to cash, and head home, but in the spirit of those last few pulls on the slot machine a few last minute reflections.

On our way in to Reno, it was evident that the Biggest Little City has gotten bigger.  It’s developed its own sprawl.  Many of those doing the sprawling are expatriates of the San Francisco Bay Area who found that they could buy a huge home in Reno suitable for inflating the ego and impressing the friends and family.  They also found, once it was too late, that it gets hotter on the edge of a desert than it does near the bay and the lifestyle is different (not necessarily better or worse, just different) out here.  And so when they decided that they wanted to return to the Bay Area they found that they couldn’t afford to.  Too bad, so sad.

As we explored the casino at our temporary home, The Atlantis, I noticed some definite changes, the biggest one being the sound.  Oh yeah there are the usual gaming machine sound effects but something was missing.  I didn’t know what it was until I went to put a coin in a slot machine.  I examined the machine high and low and couldn't find a coin slot and then discovered, uhhh, they don’t take coins.  They take bills and then you play in increments of anywhere from pennies to dollars.  And if they don’t take coins they don’t dispense coins so that clanking of quarters in the payout box is gone.  Now you don’t get a flood of quarters you get a voucher that you exchange at a machine. Very disappointing.

So now you don’t see the blue haired woman or the fellow sporting a boiler and Bermuda shorts and dress socks drifting around the casino with a gin and tonic in one hand and a bucket of quarters in the other.  Just the blue hair, the boiler, the shorts, the dress socks and the gin and tonic; no bucket of quarters.

You also don’t see cashiers roaming the aisles of slots.  Even in Sin City mechanization has eliminated jobs.  Will the same phenomenon happen in the borellos?  Hmmm, maybe best not to go there.

At some point I did notice one sound effect that seems common in every casino we visited.  Sixties and seventies pop played non stop, 24/7.  The speakers played every bad song from that era, from Petulia Clark, to The Monkees to the Bee Gees.  There was a veritable orgy of Neil Diamond, it seemed his whole, horrid catalog.  Well I couldn't very well expect them to play The Grateful Dead and The Jefferson Airplane now could I.  Pink Floyd's, "Money" might have lent an ironic twist.

Every visit to Reno reminds me of my Aunt Bonnie from Salt Lake City.  She and my Uncle Al would occasionally meet us in Reno.  Aunt Bonnie had the greatest slot machine luck of anyone I’ve ever known.  She would put in a quarter or three and within a couple of pulls the slot machine gods would bestow a bucket full of silver.

Most of the machines don’t have mechanical reels anymore.  All video.  Makes me a little suspect.  Aunt Bonnie would probably take a look at these video machines and exclaim as she was often wont, “Oh bullshit.”  Then she would sit down and play; and win. 

It took about a half day of feeding the machines before I got as comfortable as I could with all the different permutations of how those things work.  I did win about an eighty dollar jackpot on a slot machine with some sort of big game fishing theme, “That’s a Keeper.”

One thing that hasn’t changed; inside of the first thirty minutes I’d already smoked a pack or two of cigarettes of the second hand brand.

One member of our little party asked the question, besides gaming what’s the industry in Reno?  A drive down Virginia Street revealed at least three costume shops; what’s that about?  There were a couple of lingerie shops.  A fair amount of tattoo and piercing parlors.  A couple of wedding chapels.  We’ve passed a pair of strip clubs.  All possible offshoots of alcohol consumption? 

And then there are the pawn shops and a few lenders offering loans against car titles.  Off shoots of alcohol and gaming.  One enterprising fellow has a combination pawn shop, t-shirt shop. 

From the “that’s just wrong department;” my wife and I were having dinner at a little Italian styled café in our hotel and noticed a couple who drifted over from our restaurant to the all you can eat buffet restaurant to grab some desserts to bring back to their tables.

I’m on vacation and probably shouldn’t be getting into politics, but….I’ve noticed more than a few housekeepers here in this hotel and the Silver Legacy where my son is staying and most if not all of them seem to be either Hispanic or Filipina immigrants.  Legal or not I couldn’t say.  With the unemployment rate soaring where are all the unemployed Americans?  I guess the point here is it seems to give some validity to the old argument that there are some jobs that white America won’t deign to take. 

And while we’re on employment.  Let’s see, we didn’t raise taxes on the rich a while back because they’re, as the GOP likes to say, the “job creators.”  They railed to the heavens that taxing the rich would stifle job creation.  Latest figures; no new jobs.  I’m just wondering when those job creators are going to stop sitting on their cash, reaping their tax benefits and start creating jobs.  Wait, I know.  Somewhere around the tenth of NEVER.

Looking around on a busy Saturday  last night one wouldn’t think we’re in a recession.  Could any of these folks be among the unemployed just hoping to win the next couple of mortgage payments?

A touch of nostalgia over the weekend.  With my son and daughter in law as they took their daughter around the midway at Circus Circus.  All totaled we spent a fair amount of money at the games trying to win her some stuffed animals with an equally fair amount of success; 4 plush toys.  Brought back memories of doing the same for my children.

Just what is it with dealers that they seem to have this werewolf quality about them. Playing 21 during the day I seemed to be doing quite well thank you. I wasn't getting rich but I was slowly getting ahead one five dollar chip at a time with some decent hands.  Sun went down and suddenly I got fed a steady diet of 12s through 15s. On those rare occasions when I drew 19s and 20s the dealer was drawing 20s and 21s.

And what is it with players who continually hit 14s and 15s?  I do thank them for drawing that inevitable 10 that would otherwise go to the dealer.

And then there was the fellow who railed at his wife for splitting tens.  There was plenty of that going around as well; taking a likely winning hand and turning it into two potentially losing hands. No wonder the casinos do so well.

Last night I found myself down to the last 4 or 5 chips in my pocket and the little devil on my shoulder whispered to me to pull out a couple of twenties and buy more chips.  I told him to go back to hell, went to the room gathered all of my chips that I'd kept out of harm's way and cashed them in. Gambling was done for the weekend.  Eighty dollars spent and a hundred eighty returned.  Not bad.  It wasn't an early retirement check but neither did I give my business to the loans for car titles entrepreneur.

In the days of my childhood Reno used to play off of its pioneer, mining and cowboy heritage.  This area was a product of the Comstock silver lode.  It seems the quest for quick and easy riches that were neither quick or easy has always been present here.  The wild west theme has more or less gone by the boards now.  In America, with the exception of guns, the wild west has lost its allure.

The last supper.  Our last dinner came down to a coin toss between the steak house and a nice dry aged 20 ounce Porterhouse or all you can eat sushi.  The rib orgy of two nights previous had about worn out what ever fortitude my intestines have had for awhile and so sushi won out.

And now it's time for the weekend's biggest gamble; getting on the highway.  Wish me luck.