18 - Las Vegas: Our Luck Ran Out When the Police Came

              October 14, 1978: It was time to leave Hollywood. My journal entries were terse.
             Left for Vegas. Called home. Hot drive. Desert. Vegas an unreal oasis with enough neon to facsimile daylight. The Dunes, Caesar’s Palace, The Sands, Hacienda, Holiday Casino, Flamingo, Sahara, ad neon. Slot machines everywhere, from hotel lobbies to bathrooms to the little cafes outside of Vegas. 

              We drove around looking for a hotel. First drove to Caesar’s Palace, in tattered shorts and undies. We followed the fountains and lights inside with our suits and backpacks, expecting to get a cheap room. The rooms weren’t cheap - $50 – nor were they available. Then followed a one hour search for a vacant space in a hotel or motel. We drove to several places that couldn’t help us, until one hotel worker made some calls for us and secured a spot in the Granada Inn, new place right off the Strip, for just $19 for the night. We showered, put on our suits, and drove to the Strip.

              (I don’t know what to make of the line, “in tattered shorts and undies.” I hope it did not mean we actually walked into Caesar’s Palace in our undershorts. If so, I understand why they did not have a room.)

              We first stopped at the Hacienda for a cheap dinner. We never ate. The hundreds of slots took our attention. W had good momentary success with the poker slots, moving from machine to machine and winning a bucketful of quarters, close to $100. He lost most of it soon.

              I played $1 and $2 minimum blackjack, being brought free drinks and feeling like a big shot tipping the waitress a buck or two with each one. [I was drinking Rusty Nails, Scotch and Drambuie, which to this day remains my go-to gambling drink] 

              I was enjoying moderate success at Blackjack. We both did well at roulette but got crushed at the Big Six wheel. We moved on to “Sleazy Sy’s” to redeem some coupons for free food, free color photo and hundreds of more slots.        

              I sure wish I could find that color photo of me and W; we otherwise took no photos in Las Vegas. I pulled that photo of Sy’s “Twe Dollar Bill” off the internet. (Seems Mr. Sy merchandise fetches a pretty penny on Ebay these days.) The only token I saved from that trip was a matchbook from the Stardust.

              Mr. Sy’s is where we met the man I called “Lefty.” 

              A one-armed man came over to me and urged me to play slot machine #29. “I’ve been losing at the damn thing and it’s ready to hit. Put a dollar in.” I did and WHAM - $20.  He said, “Give me $4.” This I did gladly. He said, “Try this one.” I won another $20. This went on for two or three more consecutive wins. I was up $100 and giving “Lefty” a few bucks each time. Then he and I tried a few together, hit half, and split the pots. Lefty also pulled a winner with his stump.

              Now it’s not uncommon for luck to run out in Vegas, but it usually doesn’t leave with a police escort:

              Then a cop told Lefty to stop hassling me and that killed the magic. I lost all I won in slots. I went to the car to sleep while W whittled away about $40 in nickels. We got back to the Granada at about 6 AM, awoke to a knock at 10:30 AM, and left Vegas. 

              While we were gambling, I had no idea what time it was. Las Vegas was known for not having clocks, and I didn’t wear a watch. I actually went into a back room and found the employee time clock and was amazed to see it was something like 5 AM.

              When I returned in 2018, many of those landmarks were gone - the Granada Inn, Stardust, Mr. Sy’s, and the Hacienda:            

             My 2018 visit to Las Vegas was my fourth since 1978, and my second solo. Las Vegas is a lot more fun with other people. During my other solo stop, for a seminar in 2013, I had this unforgettable experience with an all you can eat buffet.

              This time I wasn’t into Vegas, maybe because I didn’t want to let go of Sedona. There I was, sitting in a sunny courtyard coffee shop, listening to some guy play wooden flute to conjure mystical vortex spirits, when I said to myself, hell, Nick, you have to go. It wasn’t quite the Blues Brothers driving to Chicago, but it was pretty spontaneous, and after driving through the evening, I pulled onto the strip at about 8:30 PM.

              Where Bruce and I shied away from Caesar’s $50 price tag in 1978, I jumped at it when I found it online for $103. Plus taxes, $117. And don’t forget the $40 resort fee, $15 parking fee, and my favorite, when I went to make coffee in my room, the $13 price tag for one of those Keurig cups.

              I had originally planned to stay one night, and not sleep, with the aid of one of these interesting cocktails: 

           Instead I purchased a double espresso and went to work looking for the cheapest blackjack table I could find. Now I don’t play often, but I consider myself reasonably competent. Until this happened. I saw a $15 minimum table and decided to search for a $10 option. I found one and sat down. I bought some chips, anted, and as the dealer shuffled, I was puzzled to see that the table markings were unfamiliar. Things got weirder when the dealer gave me three cards, face down. He asked me what I wanted to do and I responded, “What game is this?!” Well, it was three card poker and I was quickly out my first $10.

              Chastened, I moved to the $15 Blackjack table, double checking as I settled in and ordered a Rusty Nail. By the time my drink arrived I was out of my first $100 in chips. I cashed in another $100 – the extent of my $200 gambling budget – and that was gone before I finished my drink. It wasn’t even 10 PM.

              Demoralized, I played a few slots, trying to summon the spirit of Lefty. Where was the Sedona wooden flute when you needed it? I’m probably the only person in the world who doesn’t know how to play slots. I thought I lined up three cute little diamond shapes twice in a row, but there was no lights, no siren, and no payout. 

              I got a dinner at Gordon Ramsay’s pub and called it a night. I left in the morning, back for Arizona, ready to take on the Grand Canyon.

              Bruce and I felt about the same in 1978. I wrote:

              One night was cool, but too unreal and too expensive. We packed up our suits and drove through the desert, got the “Rose for Governor” sign*, passed the “Last Slot Machines in Nevada” sign, drove over Hoover Dam, and got into Grand Canyon Village at 9 PM.

              Next: Defending my title as "The Beer Chugging Champion of the Grand Canyon."

              *I do believe we actually purloined a “Rose for Governor” sign because Bruce had a good friend with the same last name. Perhaps that is why Robert Rose lost that election.

              Outside photo credits: Hacienda, Strip and Sy’s: vintagelasvegas.com; Sy’s bill, iperniti.com.