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Once Casino Player and Strictly Slots magazines cancelled and refunded all subscribers from Washington state this summer, you knew things were going downhill fast. Washington's anti-gambling legislation even filtered down to mere mentions of online gambling in the state's newspapers.
The online poker player in Washington state can receive a Class C felony, resulting in up to a year in prison.
Late last night and the final day before the Senate broke before elections, the Republicans backdoored their own runner-runner with Senate majority leader Bill Frist sneaking in the Internet Gambling Prohibition Act attached to a Port Security bill... something clearly unrelated.
Once that happened, online poker for U.S. players was done for. With Homeland Security being particularly sensitive right now, Congress couldn't not vote for port defense.
The Senate passed 80-19.
The House passed 409-2.
The only one-outer is that the President doesn't sign.
As many people have thought, particularly in this political climate, it was only a matter of time.
Sen. John Kyl was a big part of why I moved to Las Vegas in the first place. I became nervous every time he threw around his bill, and it kept looking like Congress would pass it every time they reconvened.
I'd been gambling online long before I began playing poker online, but Kyl was always around every step of the way. It became more and more difficult to fund accounts, beginning with a direct link to my checking account and then credit cards and PayPal. I thought we may have been in the clear with NETeller and other web wallets based outside of the U.S.
And then poker exploded.
I don't think it helped online poker's cause when poker sites went public or began mainstream advertising or introduced blackjack and other casino games, blurring the line between poker being mostly a skill game.
We won't fully know the impact of how this will affect not only the estimated $6 billion spent per year by online gamblers (with a good third from poker and a good half coming from the U.S.) but also the multi-billion-dollar advertising revenue that will be lost.
The casino and poker sites will stay and some may provide workarounds for the U.S. player. But like Casino Player and Strictly Slots, I suspect many will simply dump their U.S. players.
It's all so ridiculous, telling people what they can and can't do with their money. What is this, the 1920s?
In time, will "Dateline" begin airing "To Catch an Online Gambler"?
— —
Tuesday, September 26, 2006
Polygamous poker
With polygamist Warren Jeffs in custody, every time I hear him in the news it reminds me when I first heard of him earlier this year.
I was playing 4/8 limit at a locals casino in Vegas when a news broadcast came on, soundlessly mentioning that he was on the FBI's Ten Most Wanted List.
A few minutes later the flop was Q-K-Q.
I said, "Look: polygamy."
Trying to sell it, I laughed too loudly at my dumb joke.
No one else did.
Apparently polygamy isn't funny business to the Mormon majority in Las Vegas.
Ah, I miss those local poker grumps!
§
PokerRoom.com rolled out their latest tier, GoldRoom, and they're promoting it with a 50 percent reload bonus, up to $500 (use code GOLD). It's good until Oct. 2.
But careful -- unlike their previous SilverRoom bonus a couple weeks ago of 7x clearing, this one is 10x. In other words, it'll take 43 percent longer to clear. You still have 60 days from date of deposit before it expires.
Because I cleared the SilverRoom in a feverish weekend all in blackjack (unlike Party, Paradise, and UltimateBet, you do earn points playing blackjack or any of the casino games that PokerRoom offers), I still have over 1500 points that is the monthly requirement for GoldRoom.
So even though I haven't played any since then, I'm GoldRoom.
With continued no play, I'll be reduced back to Silver next month, and then further reduced to Green.
So why not take advantage of being Gold while I can?
Looks like 8000 points will now buy a $150 reload bonus with a 6x clearing rate.
With $0 in my account (blackjack is bad) to work off that bonus, I think a better way to go is spending 5500 points for a ticket to a $100+8 tourney. Their $100 daily U.S. 7 p.m. tourneys guarantee a $20K payout, with 10 percent overlay because fewer than 200 people enter.
Nice thing about PokerRoom is you can review completed tourneys more than a few days old.
Yesterday (9/25), 193 entered.
Except as noted, all paid top 30. Going backwards (it isn't offered weekends):
Their data for the tourney then stops, so I'm guessing 9/11 is the first day they offered the 100+8 $20K guarantee.
The top 30 cutoff is 170 people, where 21st through 30th get $200.
Throwing out 9/15 because it seems an anomaly, this averages 177.7 people, or an average $2230 that PokerRoom has been adding to the pot the past couple weeks.
Not bad at all, and it makes me wonder why I haven't been entering this tournament on a straight buy-in without points.
For $100+8, PokerRoom also offers a daily Aussie tourney at 4 a.m. (though only guaranteed at $6K) and a European tourney at 2 p.m., guaranteed at $20K but an impossible time for me.
Interestingly, the European tourney consistently has more people than the U.S. tourney. Not much more, but enough to bump it past the overlay.
This says PokerRoom has more non-U.S. players, or their U.S. players just aren't interested in playing $100+ tourneys.
My plan is to use up all my points on two $100+8 tickets for this week if I manage to get home in time and if there are over 170 players. If I cash, I'll withdraw and then redeposit using the bonus code.
Will report back whining on the inevitable beats that knocked me out early.
— —
Monday, September 25, 2006
What's in a number?
Played all 2/4, 3/6, 5/10, 50NL, 100NL, and tournaments this miserable, good card-forsaken weekend.
KK vs. Q10 KK vs. 88 (twice) AA vs. 45s AA vs. 9-10 (he raises, I reraise all-in, he flops trips) AA vs. 33 AA vs. A4o
That makes the past eight times I've had AA they haven't held up.
Going all-in preflop with a higher pocket pair feels the same as doubling down in blackjack. Statistically, it's correct to double on 11, but man do I seem to get a ton of low cards when I do that. Online, you can get a stats table of percentages of your hands and the dealer's, but what it doesn't tell you is how often you tie, how often the dealer nudges you out by 1, and how often your splits and double-downs lose. Not saying online blackjack is rigged, because I certainly get the same rotten luck in live casinos.
If the Subject has good hole cards pre flop, they are required to make a large raise. If they have Aces or Kings and there is a re-raise situation, then the Subject must go all in pre-flop and put the opponent to the test. The Subjects guidelines will be to get the money across the line while he is the leader. While it is recognized that poker is a game of odds and as such, sometimes the underdog wins, in the long run, all-in situations where the Subject has wired Aces will result in a favorable outcome.
I'm now convinced there's either no God, God is against online gambling, or God is telling me I need to stop.
So that's it for me and poker for the next few months.
I still have maxed credit cards, an empty bank account, and a Vegas trip I need to save for. And it's a bit ridiculous I have no microwave and I eat Taco Bell off the floor, while dumping thousands of dollars to the people who're luckier than I am.
I'll still play an SnG or two here and there, but it won't be more than $30.
I just can't keep sinking money into what's become a complete luck game in low-limits.
Stupid poker.
§
When we have a new build of a slot machine, we place it in the lab as well as in the office for internal testing.
This is the fun part of the job, where game development staff is encouraged to play the game and give comments.
The game is essentially finished, complete with glass artwork and looking like what you'd see in the casino.
Much like field testing, we'll loiter and watch other people play if we're not playing ourselves. It's still exciting seeing people enter the bonus round, retrigger it, and win something big. It's a thrill even in demo mode, when you can force the machine to award you the bonus feature. You can also force the progressive, and hearing those symbols fall into place gets my heart racing.
Whenever I sit down to play, I imagine beginning with a certain amount and I play what I'd normally play if it were real (usually $1.25 to $2.50 per pull). I have the same rush whether winning or losing, something I've noticed others don't have. If I lose money, even if it's fake, I'm bummed.
On a really big win (say, 40 times your initial bet), we've amped up the sound of the tally (which we call "bangup"), so everyone within half a mile of the machine can hear it.
And it's loud.
No wonder many people wear headphones as they work.
A bunch of us were gathered around having a water cooler conversation while watching someone play.
Someone was debating whether to award a player 15 free spins with a x3 multiplier or 10 spins with a x4 multiplier. I said 15 x3 and the other designers agreed.
For one thing, it's more spins.
For another, the number 4 just feels wrong.
There are certain numbers that feel better than others in free spin bonuses. Maybe it's because I've been primed (so to speak) by these numbers from playing the games so many years. The numbers chosen for the free spin bonuses do seem pretty consistent from game to game across all slot manufacturers (and then Atronic -- which puts out the Deal or No Deal slots -- had to go and introduce 21 lines, for paylines in 21-cent increments). It's arbitrary in a way; the math guys can always reconfigure their sheets to factor in a different spin and multiplier.
Could it be we favor prime numbers when it comes to gambling? Think of 7 and 11 in craps. Slot reels tend to be 3-reels or 5-reels. Or odd numbers? 21 in blackjack. 9 in baccarat.
Instinctively, the numbers 3, 5, and 7 all feel right for numbers of free spins. 2, 4, 6, and 8... bleah. Yet 9 is okay. (So is 10, actually.) 11 goes back to prime and is okay. 12 is bad. 13 is okay.
Strange, eh? You'd think it'd be the opposite, since we seem to favor even numbers more. Some people are like that regarding age, where an even-numbered age or year is good but an odd number isn't. Or vice-versa.
Maybe we need even numbers to feel safe, whereas odd numbers are dangerous and lend themselves more to gambling.
A caller to Ron & Fez was saying how when he sets his car temperature, if it's in the 60s it has to be an odd ending number (67, 69), but if it's in the 70s, it has to be an even ending number (72, 74). That's more obsessive-compulsive, but I wonder how something like that starts.
If we had eight fingers and used a base-8 system, would numbers feel differently?
Back to the test game, there's a human character and a dog, and in the bonus round the human is seen dancing (if you're curious, he's doing the cabbage patch dance). I noted that I'd like to see other dances, along with the dog dancing as well. Then I joked that it'd be funny to see the dog humping the guy's leg.
Seemingly on the same wavelength, one of the animators did just that but then took it out.
I then said it'd be fun to see the dog tugging at a woman's dress until it ripped off in the dog's mouth.
Like that Gerber ad and Brooke Shields, I said.
A mathematician corrected me -- "You mean Coppertone and Jodie Foster?"
Oh yeah. Sometimes I have dyslexic memories.
Turns out they'd also animated exactly that at one point.
At a brainstorm meeting that devolved into silly ideas, we were throwing around game titles and license ideas. Someone mentioned Neil Diamond. Thinking myself particularly witty, I said, "How about Neil Double Diamond"? You know, because Double Diamonds are big on three-reel mechanical slots. Neil also has that "Cherry, Cherry" song that could go with it.
Someone had already thought of that, too.
Dang.
I submitted a patentable gameplay idea to my boss, who said he already patented it four years ago. And showed it to me, along with Excel sheets where he was working out the math.
I suppose it's good to see I'm on the same wavelength creatively, even though my ideas (both serious and silly) have already been thought up.
It's a challenge thinking outside the box that they're already thinking outside.
— —
Friday, September 22, 2006
$10,000 into $1 million or $0 into $200
Despite the annoying song that you can't turn off even if you skip the intro, I'm going to follow a trio of poker players in their Million Dollar Poker Experiment that began yesterday.
Their concept is to give $10,000 each to three players of different skill levels and watch them try to turn it into $1 million a year from now.
I don't think it can be done, but I'll particularly be watching Ian Collins, whose previous big win was turning $20 into $100.
The three have to follow specific guidelines, such as taking money off the table if they triple up in no-limit. Not a bad idea, really. You spend all night building up a nice stack and then lose it all in one hand.
Good thing I'm not involved, I'd be sneaking money into slots and blackjack.
For my own personal challenge, I'm going to follow along with them and start with $1000 and see how far I can take it. If I bust, I'll turn in my poker playing membership card, become Slots Grub, and take a very long break from poker.
My Stars quest to work through the bonuses so far has been painful. I can't play as many SnGs as I'd like because of my intermittent Internet connection, so I'm doing cash games.
The last four times I've had pocket Aces have been cracked -- three times in no-limit, once in limit. I get queasy having AA in the blinds in limit because rarely does anyone fold to a preflop raise ('course, rarely does a reraise or all-in push out JJ-KK or AK in no-limit).
In this case, I lost to A4s with a 4 on the flop (rainbow), 4 on the river. I always think about check-calling on the river, but I do want that value bet.
The no-limit hands all lost to pocket pairs, one all-in preflop (a runner straight), one flopped a set, another rivered a set. If players are all-in, Stars does not let you see the other players' hole cards until the the entire board is shown. Not sure why; their tournaments are different.
I've cleared three $120 bonuses, which haven't helped because I had to reload three times.
And the bad part -- I tilt by playing blackjack, losing much more.
Sometimes I hope for the Internet connection to not work, just so I can go do something else. But usually I find myself continually clicking "reconnect" like a Skinner rat blindly hitting the lever for a random reinforced food pellet.
A couple nights ago a timeout happened when I was 44th with pocket Kings (top 40 cash). By the time I was able to reconnect half an hour later, I was out in 38th. At least I got my money back.
Still have four $120 bonuses to clear and I'm sallying forth.
The 5x clearing is going pretty fast. The most recent reload is 7x, now with an expiration date.
I'm assuming that's the way it's going to be with Stars from now on, and after this is finished, I'll wash my hands with them and say goodbye. For multi-tabling, their interface isn't as responsive as I'd like.
§
Found another online casino that will give you money to play with, no deposit necessary.
It's Mummys Gold, they use the trustworthy Microgaming, and they start you off with $500.
Any withdrawal must be between $20 and $200 over and above the $500 (so your actual cashout will be $520 to $700 and they'll remove the $500). If you hit a big jackpot, all you'll be able to withdraw is $200. Keep that in mind.
I was looking forward to testing them out, but every time I reached the final page of registration, I kept getting the system error, "An illegal operation was performed."
They finally emailed saying that accounts cannot be set up in Illinois, Indiana, Nevada, South Dakota, Washington, Wisconsin, Oregon, and Louisiana because "online gaming is restricted from these states."
Nice of them to warn us before the fact; listing those states right on their website or within the software might be nice.
And my account with one of their other online casinos is still active, why didn't they shut that down?
Anyway, I can't verify the legitimacy of the $500 bonus, but it seems okay. Just make sure to read the terms & conditions and make sure you don't live in one of those seven states.
— —
Tuesday, September 19, 2006
"What is that big wet stain by your penis, I mean honestly"
DP had a poker game over the weekend, with one of his friends getting progressively drunk until he snapped and began raising and going all-in on every hand.
The change was none too subtle, shifting right after a bad beat which wouldn't have been so bad had he connected with any of the flop.
The head-scratching hand of the night was his stone cold bluff with 58o, effectively 8 high on the flop with overcards and a flush draw, neither of which matching either of his cards.
His hand didn't hold up.
Every chance he had, he hurled an insult at one of the guys who left, who had previously announced he was leaving an hour earlier and just so happened to win a big pot off him a few minutes earlier.
He turned to me and went through all the different women he's dated since, well, birth.
He took turns befriending me and calling me an asshole.
He wrote IOUs to DP for $100 at a time. He signed an "X" and DP had the signature witnessed.
We figured he was into the game $400.
This, all on .5/1, by the way.
Suddenly people who were going to leave decided to stay.
Scotch and German beer continued to pour, and the guy ran to the bathroom every other hand (meanwhile screaming out to post for him).
At one point we thought he left for good. He lost one more pot, he was down to $13 for cab fare, and we didn't see him for 10 minutes. Then he returned, borrowing another $100, and continued tilting another half hour.
I don't think I've ever seen such a sustained tilt session before. In Vegas, this is any weekend night, but usually either they start winning and quiet down or their friends come get them and they head off to a strip club or they pass out at the table and are escorted out by security.
DP and others just licked their lips at having a live one. Me, I never do well against luck so I tried to stay out of as many pots as I could against him unless I had the nuts (which in his case would've been Ace high).
I maintained my composure until one of the guys looked at him upon his final return from the bathroom and said, "What is that big wet stain by your penis, I mean honestly."
The "I mean, honestly" is what got me, and I started cracking up.
We looked at him and the whole front of his pants was indeed wet. I shudder to think what DP's bathroom floor looked like.
And then he left for good.
The last time this happened, they said, he took the bus to the riverboats and continued playing on tilt.
I think it crossed each of our minds to join him.
— —
Friday, September 15, 2006
Fun with slot math
A new lonelygirl15 vblog is up, showing Bree taking iron pills. The bandage on her arm looks like it came from bloodletting. I think the upcoming ritual she's preparing for (memorizing, dieting) is headed toward a sacrifice on Oct. 12.
We're also treated to a new storyline involving Cassie, who posted her own vlog called "This Is My Story Now."
Creepy and mysterious, the series is headed into a thrilling Japanese horror direction after establishing likeable characters we care about.
A couple times, Bree asked Daniel about Cassie, but Daniel didn't know who she was. Bree's stated before that Daniel was her only friend. Who is this Cassie?
I think Bree is Cassie. But she isn't yet aware.
I grew up on Agatha Christie novels and love a good mystery. lonelygirl15 is the most interested I've been in an evolving story since Twin Peaks.
MTV News did an interview with the actors and creators of the show, and while I still don't know why they came out of the closet so soon, I'm glad they're continuing and I'm enjoying where they're taking the story.
I haven't watched many of the audience response videos, but I liked this funny press conference parody on lonelygirl15, as told by the Purple Monkey.
§
Until Sept. 19, PokerStars has a 20 percent (up to $120) reload bonus but it now comes with a catch: it takes 6 months to clear and it's placed after any currently stacked bonuses you may have. This will probably be the case with all future Stars bonuses, perhaps with even less of a timeframe to clear it.
Though my favorite site is still Full Tilt (despite losing over $1500 while amassing 10,000 points to get into the Aussie Millions freeroll next Saturday), I need to start clearing some of the bonuses I've built up.
I have several $120 Stars bonuses to clear since July 2004 and will be attempting to do so all in low-limit SnGs. Stars is one of the few places where the entire tourney fee is refunded by the bonus, so if you're working off a bonus, every SnG and multi-table tourney you enter is like it's rakefree.
Poker's been kicking my ass lately, being beaten by a swarm of unbelievable 2-outers. Not so bad in limit, worse in no-limit when we're both all-in preflop. When that river card slams down the other guy's set, I feel like Philip Seymour Hoffman in Owning Mahoney.
I'm beginning to think that I shouldn't be so aggressive preflop, that a large reraise would be good enough instead of pushing, because people may be putting me on bluffs, a small pair, or AK.
That's the only reason I can think why they call with medium pairs.
I play this way because I don't want to see someone flop a set or an Ace or King if I have QQ. But maybe I'll need to risk that and play more post-flop.
Having my large raises called is good except when they hit, which seems is happening much more often than it should.
And playing with a girl's name doesn't exactly gain me more respect at the table.
§
My father was a mathematics genius, and I always felt I was a disappointment to him by failing to grasp math concepts (particularly geometry) and failing Calculus in high school. I felt Mrs. Constantine took pity on me and curved my grade up to a D so I could graduate.
I mentioned my horrendous math skills to the slot people when I interviewed. The two most frequent questions I was asked during the interviews were how willing I would be to move to Chicago and how my math was. I never thought I would move to Chicago (much less be offered the job), otherwise I probably wouldn't have admitted how bad at math I am.
But how hard could slot math be? It's simply working out odds, similar to poker odds.
Like any puzzle (including lonelygirl15), I'm fascinated by the math involved in a slot machine and hope to eventually work out the math for one of our new games. There was a time when game designers were also the mathmeticians.
One designer said it took him two weeks to figure out the math for a new game we're working on; a mathmetician looked at it and figured it out in two hours.
Here's a math trick I picked up for quickly multiplying any 2-digit number by 11.
Simply add the two digits and insert it in between the same two digits.
Example A:
12 x 11
12 1 + 2 = 3 1 3 2
Example B:
45 x 11
45 4 + 5 = 9 4 9 5
If the sum is over 9, carry the 1 and add to the first number.
Example C:
74 x 11
74 7 + 4 = 11 8 1 4
Amaze your friends!
— —
Tuesday, September 12, 2006
lonelygirl15, we hardly knew thee
The more that it went on, the more fascinating the storyline of lonelygirl15 morphed into, and with the candles, Aleister Crowley photo, strange unexplained bandaged arm, and the Purple Monkey puppet rating cookies 10, 12, and 06 (an 06 instead of 6 could be indicative of the year 2006, with 10/12/06 coincidentally Crowley's birthday and also one day before a Halloween Friday the 13th), I think it was all building to something occultish that would culminate with Bree being shockingly sacrificed by Satanists.
A screenwriting (also magician) trick: to make a deus ex machina clue not so obvious, or to add backstory without it seeming it's a setup, introduce it along with something funny or charming to divert attention.
lonelygirl15's video blogs are certainly charming, with mysterious subtle clues scattered about that could either be fun and lighthearted and unnoticeable on the surface, but in rewatching after her eventual death, would in hindsight have lead toward something sinister.
Imagine if the Taster's Choice serial commercials had references to 666.
With audience involvement and affection toward the characters in lonelygirl15, Bree's sudden death would've made her still more memorable, pushing her even more into cult and myth status... if she isn't already there.
As it is, though, over the weekend the people behind her admitted on lonelygirl15's website that she is indeed a creation (perhaps by way of Creative Artists Agency), possibly as a tool to promote unsigned musicians (many of Bree's videos were cut and edited to new music).
But I'm not sure why they felt the need to confess, at least not until where the story was heading on Oct. 12.
Or did they? The website is currently down, and who knows if the people who set up the site are actually related to lonelygirl15?
They've so carefully orchestrated and unveiled the story thus far, that maybe this is just another installment.
Digging further, a Los Angeles lawyer named Kenneth Goodfried filed for a lonelygirl15 trademark last month, and his phone number matches to someone named Jeffrey Goodfried, who was a production assistant on a couple movies in the early '80s.
Here's hoping the trademark is more for the intellectual property itself and not for a series of lonelygirl15 stuffed purple monkeys in stores by Christmas.
Whether it's an eventual promotion for a Grudge-like movie, music, product, or just frustrated filmmakers wanting their work seen, I hope more video blogs continue to surface on YouTube starring Bree, Daniel, and the Purple Monkey.
Because I want to know what happens next.
— —
Sunday, September 10, 2006
A free $200 to play slots
If you want to check out some online slots, here's a way without putting up any money of your own. If you get lucky, you may even win a little.
Today only, Royal Vegas Casino is offering a free $200 to play slots with, no deposit necessary.
Normally this offer is $100, but they've doubled it under the guise of beta-testing, although I'm not really sure what they're beta-testing, and I didn't fill out any form or survey.
Download the software, register an account, and then follow the directions. Either $100 or $200 will be credited, depending when you install.
The only catch I see is that you must wager a cumulative $200 all on slots, and you can only cash out anything over $200.
But not a bad deal for not risking anything.
Online casinos that offer free upfront credits to play with are few and far between, so I checked it out.
Of all the online groups, I trust Microgaming the most, and it's nice to see more and more online casinos switching to it. Many of the MG slots are available for the $20 playthrough. Not the latest, but the ones from maybe a year ago, with the most recent probably Tomb Raider.
I chose Thunderstruck, Vinyl Countdown, and Spring Break before going bust on $2.25 and $4.50 bets per pull.
Off Thunderstruck (one of my favorite online slots), my biggest hit was $70, putting my balance at $250. But by the time I met my $200 playthrough, I was below and never recovered.
There are two ways you can look at this offer.
One is to sample each of the online slots available, if you enjoy slots, or if you just want to see what's available online without paying anything.
The other is to win as much as possible.
I'm part of both camps, but I've reconciled the fact that I'm not going to see the latter.
If you take advantage of this offer and you're going for the big win, I'd recommend betting as high as you can. These are volatile slots, meaning if you hit (such as the free spins in the bonus round), it'll pay well. On the contrary, the pays for the large hits come out of the regular pays, so you could spin awhile without any return.
Another thing about these online slots vs. real casino slots is that their payout percentage is higher, typically in the mid- to high-90 percent range.
And you won't see a brick-and-mortar casino ever offering an unknown player a free $200 to play with.
— —
Wednesday, September 06, 2006
The odds a vending machine will fall on you
In the cafeteria at work, a woman I hadn't seen before was trying to claim a bag of chips that was caught in the vending machine.
She banged and kicked and pounded the poor thing, muttering, "Oh for fuck's sake."
People pretended not to notice. I just stared at the sight, in line to pay for a chicken sandwich (with chips, I might add), wondering how anyone could be set off by losing 65 cents.
Maybe this was her second 65 cents lost? Or her last 65 cents? Or she was diabetic and needed the sugar?
Our drink vending machines are only 25 cents, and choices include both Diet Pepsi and Diet Coke. With this bargain right next door to the food vending machine, I would've considered the 65 cents a wash, writing it off to eventually even out against the cheap Diet Cokes.
It was then I noticed people were pretending not to notice because they were afraid what would happen next.
Which did happen next. The woman began rocking the machine, pushing it back and forth. And I admit my eyes widened as I thrilled at the evil thought, "Oh please God let the thing tip over and fall on her."
Because, well, I'd kinda like to see that.
And it would serve her right. Our company manufactures slot machines, a family of which I consider that lonely vending machine a part of.
It must be tough enough to be different from all the other machines. You're antiquated and still accept coins (on the other hand, you dispense chocolate), and now you're being manhandled and touched inappropriately.
We run exhausting and relentless tests on our slot machines, putting them through all kinds of paces -- wear and tear, shock, extreme hot and cold, power outages, surges, anything you can think of. We do this in advance of the actual regulators and to circumvent any possible lawsuits of negligence. If a drink is spilled or someone throws a chair at the video screen, the machine will not harm the player, as deserved as they might be, and in fact the machine will still register the correct amount of credits.
The back lair of the company is like the headquarters of "Q" from James Bond, an older guy with a heavy accent and white labcoat running through the latest handmade gadgets designed to replicate every possible situation a slot machine may encounter in a casino.
My favorite is the robotic handle that swings the slot machine arm at various intervals, as well as parts that were placed in subzero temperature to age them more rapidly so we know what will need replacing in 3 to 5 years.
And of course there's the room that cost half a million dollars for the purpose of something to do with radiation or radio waves or just to act as a panic room in case those Home Alone burglars stopped by. They say it's a bargain, considering renting a similar room costs $2000 per day. All I know is inside the room, cellphones don't work and you can light a lighbulb without electricity.
So while the slot machines are a set weight and designed not to tip over should someone begin climbing on them, the same cannot be said for a vending machine.
And alas, the match between machine vs. woman ended prematurely, as the woman finally gave up and called security, who came in and bought her a bag of chips from the same machine.
Later that day I found my car keyed, one of 12 other vehicle victims who parked on the public street in front of the office.
And since the incident, I've been plagued by online bad beats. The sickening two-outer, 4.5-percent chance kind.
So thinking back to the woman and the vending machine and my evil thoughts, I hereby apologize for said thoughts and will henceforth step in to assist rather than watch in amusement.
So consider this a public apology of sorts to the appropriate Catholic Saint of Keyed Cars and Cracked Aces, and please let me get back to my normal flush draw beats that I can live with.
Grubby's Hands of the Week
What is The Hammer?