what goes around comes around... or, karma: casino style!

last night at new york new york (and after having literally the best meal of my life at this place called delmonico at the venetian), carson and i played roulette. i've never played roulette. because it scares me. frankly, a lot of these games scare me, but i think i've caught a bit of the gambling fever while being here (and for the record, i'm up about $600 -- i think this is called "beginner's luck"). we were at the $10 minimum bet tables, because i'm a chicken. i had a chip on 9. the board looks like this.

now, if you were curious enough to click on that last link, you'll notice that the 9 is right above the 12. when the little evil ball did its spinaroo, it stopped on the 12. and somehow in the betting, my chip had gotten shifted so that it looked like it was between the 9 and 12. the payout for this move, called a "split" is 17 to 1. well, my bet got confused and the dealer gave me the 17 to 1 payout. but i'm terribly superstitious (not to mention woefully incapable of dishonesty), so i said to the dealer, "i can't take these chips -- i meant for my bet to be on the 9." now, either the dealer didn't want to go through the hassle of having to call the pit boss over (remember -- in casinos, there are cameras EVERYWHERE!) or he didn't care because my bet was only a dollar chip, but he thanked me for my honesty and told me to just keep it, since it looked like the chip was on the 9-12 split.

so, next spin, i put out my bets, with $2 on the 1. lo and behold, the 1 comes up, and i win $70! see, folks? honesty pays off.

and after that, carson and i moved to a table game called "let it ride", where i had two threes-of-a-kind in a row on the 3 card draw, and i again doubled carson's money.

the lesson here: don't try to cheat the casino gods. the casino gods will reward you for your forthrightness.

p.s. i had gummy bears for breakfast today. I LOVE LAS VEGAS!