#881 – Adrift in Vegas, Part I – The Night Clerk

Don’t be fooled by the name or the fancy digs. I made Shauna stay at the Gold Coast.

The trip started with such promise and ended in emptiness. That’s my unorthodox way of saying my trip to Las Vegas last week went “well” by Blog standards – meaning I obtained signficant information for future posts – but I didn’t get to do much gambling. Most important, I didn’t get to play in the WPT event at the Bellagio. In fact, the only gambling I did was playing in three WPT satellites that lasted a total of twenty-one minutes.

Shauna and I started in high spirits. On Friday, I successfully evaded jury duty, which meant instead of spending Monday at the Phoenix Municipal Courthouse, we could spend it at the Wynn and in pursuit of Matusow, Bloch, Forrest, et. al.

We decided to leave on Sunday after I finished playing the Million Dollar Guarantee tournament on Full Tilt. As I lasted hour after hour, Shauna and I took care of preliminary research and organization tasks, and Shauna arranged to stay with a friend in Vegas. This idea of saving money is new to me, but I figured since Full Tilt was springing for an assistant, we should try to keep expenses for the trip to a minimum. Especially because I was staying at the Wynn, the idea that Shauna could sponge off a friend seemed like, if you’ll pardon the pun, win-win.

We celebrated making it into the money by ordering Chinese food. After it arrived, my fortunes ebbed and flowed in a way that caused me periodically to shovel food into my mouth because I thought I was about to bust and we were about to leave. I finished fifty-second, which was nice payday, but took long enough to delay our departure past 10pm, and yet was not lucrative enough to blow off Full Tilt and the idea of writing this Blog for a living.

It was past 3am when we arrived in Las Vegas. Shauna was unable to reach her friend. (Inexcusably, her friend – an ER nurse with two children in the midst of moving – didn’t hear her phone ring in the middle of the night because of exhaustion.) In keeping with my ethic of economizing, we brainstormed over inexpensive hotels as I pulled off I-15 at Flamingo. I considered but rejected the nearby Extended StayAmerica on Valley View. Ever since they found one of their guests brewing the bio-toxin Ricin on the third floor, I’ve avoided the place myself and that includes the parking lot. I did Shauna the favor of not mentioning it as an option. Shauna mentioned the Orleans and I countered with the Gold Coast which shares the same owners and had the added benefit of being just 100 feet in front of us.

Upon entering the parking lot, we were swarmed by what I thought were bats but turned out just to be the shift change, a new crew of Gold Coast workers in their black uniforms.

As I checked Shauna in, I realized it was a little awkward at almost 4am renting a hotel room for my attractive assistant. Something in the look of the eyes of the desk clerk convinced me SHE thought it was weird too.

Come on. Way more strange things happen in the middle of the night in Vegas on a regular basis, especially at a place like the Gold Coast. I once played at a poker tournament here where a woman at my table insisted she had starred in a porno version of CINDERELLA. (I suppose it was possible, but she looked ancient and applied her make-up like a crazy person.)

The night clerk’s routine questions took on new meanings. “Are you authorizing her to make room charges on this credit card? Just local phone calls? Or movies and room service too?”

I almost started explaining our working relationship but stopped myself. It was none of her business and I didn’t care what she thought. On the other hand, I was insulted by the implication that I would stay at a luxurious place like the Wynn and then tell my girlfriend she was getting her own room, only to drop her off at a dump like the Gold Coast.

[Shauna’s reply: Reading Michael’s description of how abusive it was to put me in the Gold Coast confirms that I should have objected at the time. I had my suspicions about the place, which were confirmed Monday night when I was startled by footsteps behind me as I walked to my room. It turned out they belonged to a pair of police officers, which made me feel both better and worse. I usually try to be a positive person and make the best of whatever situation I’m in, but I know now to be suspicious if Michael ever again says he has some idea involving me and saving money.]

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