Category Archives: Thanks A Slot

Three Days – The Last Is Not Always The Best

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While remembering all of the fun that I had on Day One, including a thrilling two-color nail stamp…

On the third day, I got sick.

I’m not sure if it was an errant germ from my Wednesday (Day T-1) excursion to the casino

Wheeee! Penny machine winnings!

or the ancient dust from that desk but I started sneezing at the end of Day Two.

After a night of barely any sleep – one stretch of “AWAKE” had me up from 2:30am until 4:30am – and a tissue count of over 24*, I’d decided that I wasn’t going to attempt to head back to Dad’s, for another dust-filled day.

I bugged out of the hotel and high-tailed it home, never stopping at the usual “Last Starbucks before the NY bridges” or picking up anything for dinner.

Wes was thrilled to see me

I know he was just keeping himself warm but I can pretend he missed me.

But his response to “Can’t you make me some chicken soup?” was not a surprise.

So I cleared up my car

Sometimes even tissues can be pretty...look, but don't touch 'em

and that brings us full circle to

It's always been you, Joe.

 

*I’m very surprised that no one complained about the “fog horn” of my all-night-long, constant nose blowing.

Half Century

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On Monday, Tom came home from his 10-day work trip.  I should have put air quotes around work because he has a great time working and he also got in four rounds of golf.

Say it with me.

“Awwwwww. Poor Tom.”

OK.  So when he got home, I was hungry and – since I hadn’t cooked for almost two weeks – wanted to go out to eat.

“Let’s go to the Sands Casino.  They have a Carnegie Deli!”

The casino is the former site of Bethlehem Steel.

They have sandwiches bigger than your head!

So we ate and decided to play the slots for an hour.  We played some quarter machines and then went for the FUN stuff – the penny machines.

You know how that goes, right?  Play 30 cents and win 25…laugh.  Play another 30 cents and win 500…laugh.  We were trying to top each other’s wins.  I had made the high win with 800 ($8) and then Tom had to go ahead and top that with this…

The machine started to make all kinds of noise and just didn’t stop.  Tom kept looking around and had no idea what he had done.  I said “You won 101,512 cents!” and we laughed and kept saying “That’s $100!!” and were thrilled.

Oh, stop laughing.  We were caught up in the fun.

Two women were walking by and told him that his win was great.  He said to them, “I know!  It’s $100!” and they informed us that it wasn’t $100.  It was $1,000.

DUH!  Yes.  It was a $1,015.12 win on a 30 cent bet.  It was the highest that he’s ever won, be it a penny machine or a dollar machine, and he was beyond excited.

Still floating on that penny machine high, we left to go and drop his car off for service. We had left my car at B&N and he was going to drop me and go to Toyota.  I was going to order some dinner from the steak place and then go and pick him up.

Sounds easy, right?

If we hadn’t still been laughing, we might have realized that I had left my car keys in his glove compartment as he drove off for Toyota.

***********************

Tuesday was my birthday and I was feeling fine until someone said “You’re a half century old!”.

I would have kicked them but suddenly my sciatica was acting up and I couldn’t lift my leg high enough.

Sheesh.

At least there was cake!

At 12:15, there was cake.

2.5 seconds later, there was a lot less cake