My first trip to Sin City came in 1995, Christmas week. Newly divorced, I would see my toddler daughter on her third birthday that December 18th, prior to her departure on an annual pilgrimage to Virginia with her mother to visit her grandparents.
As I knew this would be the first of many such holidays without her, I decided I needed some distraction. Thus began a tradition that lasted a decade and some change that week between Christmas and the New Year, of gambling and skiing in rotating order.
I am a sentimental guy, though, and as I was gambling late on Christmas Eve and doing well at the legendary Hard Rock Cafe Casino on Paradise Road (then in its first year of operation), some somber news arrived. In the pre-dawn of Christmas morning, Dean Martin had died. All the neon lights and signs were turned out for half an hour along the Las Vegas Strip, as well as Paradise Road.
The gambling, however, went right on.
Back in Vegas this past weekend, nearing 30 years later, The Hard Rock is now (somewhat ironically) the Virgin Resort, and thanks to a whole lot of hotel reward points, I am staying in a spacious suite at The Venetian. As I was walking in and through the casino, I couldn’t help but notice how much smoke was in the air and on the casino floor. Apparently, select bars, airport smoking areas, and certain casinos are the last spots in America where you can light up with abandon.
While Disney World and all its guests may choose from 40,000 hotel rooms on Disney resort property, there are 150,000 and counting rooms along the Las Vegas Strip. The MGM Grand alone has more than 5,000 rooms. During a trip there in the mid-2000s a clientside trip would allow me to briefly meet Mick Jagger underneath the Rolling Stones concert stage at the Grand.
He was doing vocal warm-ups on what was to be the first in a series of “final” concert tours.
I do not gamble on every trip. And when I do, I only play blackjack and only with female card dealers and typically in the third-base position at the gaming table.I have other superstitions and customs, but I’m not going to give away the store here.I typically do well enough to warrant a few comps, and in the first decade of the 2000s, I was in the Player’s Clubs for most major casino chains.I gamble much more conservatively today, with a budget and really playing only the winnings.
I remind my friends, particularly first-timers, that the next hand probably won’t be the BIG WIN they are expecting or betting on.I tell them to remember to view gaming as an entertainment choice, and just like concert tickets today, the prices can get stratospheric pretty quickly, and all those free drinks at the table actually come at a really high price.
I have found Vegas crowds and casino floors to be incredible economic indicators.
The Uber and Lyft drivers, casino dealers, pit bosses, and others will easily tell you that Vegas has only recently recovered from the Covid travel pullback. The conventions and sporting events are back, but most of the high-roller and poker-only rooms appear to be gone, or at least hidden from view. The clinking coins slot machines, the cash cows of virtually every casino, are now silent and electronic, other than music played to indicate a big win and a paper receipt for payment to carry to the casino bank.
Compared to Vegas, Atlantic City has always seemed slightly depressing to me. The smaller, but still-growing gaming centers of Gulfport/Biloxi, Tunica, Miss., and other one-off casinos in the Americas will never quite be Las Vegas, either. Windsor, Canada, has a nice bit of luster, and Macau, just a few hours by boat from Hong Kong is worth making the trip at least once, but in this special category, Las Vegas, I think, will always be king.
And as with any other brush with royalty, I will pay my tribute and homage, thankfully again this time leaving with a bit more treasure than I brought in. And though a bit lower on the pleasure scale this visit, some important business got done for our fraternity.
Leaving a little love in “Lost Wages,” until my next return, luck be a lady.