Chapter 2

[Sunday, July 5th, 2020]

Right now, I wanted to play with gambling with this ability for a little while, so I jumped back into the tunnel.

Once again I was in the tunnel, facing another end section. The scene on the wall showing my monitor, keyboard, and mouse sitting upon my desk. I figured this would be a good way to leave it as I would probably be back at some point.

I headed back down the tunnel to the intersection and considered going back in time to the last time I was in Vegas. That was about six months ago, I’m pretty sure it was the first full week in January when I went to CES. I turned away from the golden light and headed back in time. I sped up until the days and nights were passing by at a pretty good clip and counted about 180 days. I figured that should get me close.

I happened to stop in a section where the scene showed I was at my desk at work and using my office computer. There certainly were a lot of scenes like that in my life, too much work. Focusing on the lower right corner of the computer monitor I could see the date/time was January 13th, 2020 at 2:17 pm. I had undershot a little bit.

I had gotten distracted and focused a little too much on the scene. I hadn’t intended to jump into this point in time, but here I was. Since I’m already here, I might as well verify a few things. I switched over to Outlook to check out my calendar.

Yep, this was the Monday right after the trip. The trade show was scheduled to start on the 7th, which was the previous Tuesday. There were several earlier keynote speakers, I ended up only seeing one of them before things started Tuesday morning. I flew out to Vegas in the morning on Sunday the 5th. I had taken the whole week off work, to give myself plenty of time at the show, and be able to relax some. My reservations were at The Venetian for the whole stay. I didn’t fly back until Saturday night. I also had a nice bankroll to enjoy while I was there.

I’d been saving up for the trip for a long time. My work was willing to cover the upgraded $900 event pass, but I was on my own for everything beyond $100 a day for the room. The room had cost me more than double that, but it was also a vacation for me so I was okay with splurging. It was a late Christmas present to myself. I’d had an additional 4 grand dedicated just for gambling.

I was ready to get to it, so I Jumped again.

I headed back further. If I wasn’t screwing up my math, eight nights back would put me in the hotel and or casino on the 5th. I stopped at what I thought might be midday and the scene showed me sitting at a roulette table.

I moved backward in time to see where they marked the last spin with the transparent “dolly” the dealers use for that purpose. I noted it was 29 black. I continued moving back until just before I was starting to make my bet, then focused on the scene and Jumped into my body.

I’m not sure what made me want to play roulette on this trip, it’s not usually a favorite of mine. When I do play it I mostly stick to black and red bets. I did a quick count on my chips and had about 85 light blue chips in front of me. I took about 10 of them and placed two of them each on 28 and 29, then sprinkled the rest around the board as single bets.

While I was waiting for the ball to drop, I noticed a red $5 chip on the croupier’s color layout for my color blue chips. I recounted my remaining chips, yep 75 of them. At $5 each that left me with $375 and the two I had placed on 29 black were about to pay 35 to 1. That means those two chips would soon have 70 friends coming back to my stack with them. A total stack of $735 if this all worked out. I had probably sat down initially and handed $500 to the croupier to get started.

I don’t remember this roulette session being anything special the first time through. I probably would have moved on soon anyway. That’s not a bad idea actually, there are other games I’m more interested in.

I watched as the ball dropped and bounced around, eventually settling in 29 black. Two other players were going to be paid out for betting on the same number, as well as three more who had played on either black or odd. We waited while the croupier paid out the winners. I raked in my chips and then asked him to color me up.

He did and I tipped him the $5 and walked away with $730 in a small handful of casino chips. I put them in my pocket and headed for the card tables looking to see if I could find a baccarat table. The game plays fast and there are no complicated rules to follow from the player’s side. Well, there are if you care to learn them. But if you trust the dealer to do it right, or trust the other players to keep them honest, then it’s a very simple game from the player’s perspective.

If you want to, you can just focus on betting for either the ‘Player’ or the ‘Banker’ to win a hand. There is a slight edge to the rules that mean the Banker will win very slightly more often. The casino uses that as an excuse to allow them to take a 5% commission on any bets that win for the Banker. In playing, any bet you make is matched when you win. They keep track of the commission for you, they are very good at that step. You are expected to pay it off before you leave the table or when they reshuffle the eight decks in the shoe of cards. I make it a habit to pay it off regularly as I go.

I quickly found a suitable baccarat table with a $25 minimum bet. There were two older Asian men already playing there. From the look of the discard pile, the shoe would need to be shuffled pretty soon. I grabbed a seat in the middle as the two gentlemen were on each end of the half-moon shaped table. I nodded greetings to both players and told the dealer I would wait for the new shoe.

I set my chips on the table in front of me and checked my shirt pocket. When I’m gambling that is where I prefer to keep my bankroll. I was not surprised to find another $500 in there. The bankroll of $1000 was what I remembered planning for any given day of gambling. I went ahead and put the cash with my chips and just waited.

A few hands later the yellow card protector came out of the shoe. This signaled that after this hand there would be a shuffle going on. They finished it up and everyone paid off any commissions that were owed. Then the dealer began the laborious task of shuffling the decks. She was very experienced and handled it efficiently. She offered me the yellow card to cut the decks with and I picked a spot in the middle.

I gave her my $500 in cash. She slid me 20 green $25 chips. I placed a $25 bet on Player and soon the hand was dealt and it was a Tie. That’s a push if you bet on either Player or Banker, so I just ignore them. The next hand I lost. I bet $75 on Player again. That hand won. I stayed on Player and bet $25 and lost again. $75 on Player and lost. $175 on Player and lost.

$375 on Player and Lost.

I jumped into the tunnel. That was 4 Bankers in a row. I moved backward in the tunnel until I saw my $75 winning bet get matched. I focused on the scene and Jumped back into my body.

I raked in my winnings, then placed a $25 bet on Banker. When that won I bet $25 on Banker again. Then I grabbed the purple $500 chip I got when I cashed in over at the roulette table and placed it on the Banker to win. It won and I raked in the winnings and let the $500 sit out there again. When it won I replaced it with two black $100 chips and left it there until it lost, collecting the winnings as it went. It won 5 more hands before it lost. I reverted to $25 on the Player.

I played like that through the rest of the shoe. When I saw a streak happen, I’d roll back to the appropriate spot, let it get started then make a large bet or three. Mostly I played on Player and increased my bet size when I lost, just like before. I never let myself lose 4 times in a row. When I won I would drop back to $25 bets on Player. I’m sure it probably raised some eyebrows in the camera booth. But people get on winning streaks all the time. I randomly let a few bigger bets lose too. But this was more about getting a feel for how it would work for me. It worked very well.

I liked paying down the commission if it got over $25, just because I hate owing money on general principles. When the dealer got ready to reshuffle the shoe I colored up and found I had $5770. I tipped the dealer two green chips and headed over to the cashier’s cage. Not bad for about an hour’s work. The yellow chips were nice, I hadn’t held $1000 chips before that I could recall.

I checked my watch and it was only around 3 pm, but I was pretty hungry. I decided to take a stroll along the Venetian’s interior canal and found a Mexican restaurant that looked good to me. I ordered some steak fajitas and an iced tea and thoroughly enjoyed it.

I asked around and got directions to the Venetian’s poker room. I wanted to see how I would do in a Hold’em tournament. I might want to try my hand at one of the big tournaments someday and figured this would be both fun and enlightening.

I asked the staff and was pointed to the schedule of tournaments. They had a 6:10 pm $200 No-Limit Hold’em with a Bounty - 9K guaranteed tourney in a few hours. Looking over the schedule I also saw there was a $300 MonsterStack 15K guaranteed that started at 12:10 pm. I had checked into my room shortly after 11 am this morning, so that one was also possible.

In fact, it was slightly preferred. The higher guarantee would have a bigger draw, plus I wasn’t sure about the bounty concept. I had never played with one before. It might affect how people played in odd ways that I wasn’t sure I wanted to deal with right now. I decided to go ahead and jump back to the earlier tourney.

I moved back in the tunnel until I saw myself putting away my clothes into a dresser. Then I focused on the scene and quickly entered my body. I finished the task and made sure I still had $1000 in my shirt pocket. The rest of my bankroll was hidden away in a hidden pocket of my shaving kit. I figured any thieves were more likely to make off with my crappy work laptop if they were taking anything. I wouldn’t trust a hotel room safe to guard my toothbrush.

I headed out and swung by the Poker Room to sign up for the tournament. I was kinda hungry, apparently I didn’t grab lunch today. Even though my mind remembered eating fajitas less than a half-hour ago, this body had not eaten since getting up this morning. The peanuts on the flight didn’t count for much.

I found a place nearby called Noodle Asia and had some Shrimp Pad Thai that was good. I also noticed a place called ‘Race and Sports Book’ nearby as well. I was certain I could clean up at any kind of dog or horse racing too. There were so many options. I don’t think money is ever really going to be a problem for me as long as these powers last.

It was just about time for the tourney to start, so I made my way back to the Poker Room. I was soon sitting at a table with my chips and waiting with a handful of others. It looked like there were going to be a little over a hundred players in the tourney.

I mostly stuck with standard solid play. Waited on decent hands, didn’t try stealing any blinds in the beginning. Mostly just watching the other players at my table. I only really had two hands of note before the first break at the two-hour point in the tourney.

I had 9s8s from the cutoff and I had been playing very tight for all of the first hour. It folded around to me. Blinds had recently gone up to 200-300 and I had almost $50,000 in chips from the $30K we all started with. I decided to try and steal some chips and raised it to 800. The button and the small blind folded.

The big blind thinks for a while then calls. Flop comes 8h 9d 2h. He checks it to me, I bet 1200 and he slowly calls. Turn comes 9h and I am praying he was on that flush draw and would pay me for my boat. He checks again. I think about it, there should be $6,500 in the pot. He either got there on the flush draw or he is never going to put more money in the pot anyway. I bet $7,000, hoping maybe he’ll see it as a bluff. He just calls again.

Now I’m really confused. River comes and it is Ks, which shouldn’t have helped anything he’s likely to be holding. The pot is now $20,500 if my math was right. He spends a long time thinking, then goes all in for about $25K more. The only thing that can beat me now is if he had KK, and he certainly didn’t play it like he had KK. If I lose I will only have about $5K but I can always roll it back if I need to. I call. He shows 7c7s.

Wow. Okay then, thank you for the chips.

The second interesting hand was just before the break when blinds are still 200-300 but now there was a 300 ante that the big blind pays before posting his blind. I was in the big blind with Ac9h. It folds to the button who does a 2.5x raise to 800. He’s been a solid player, and he could be doing this raise with anything in this situation, the size of the bet is common for raises at this table. I re-raise to 2,500 to defend my blind. He calls.

Flop comes Ah 6d 3s. I check, expecting him to make a continuation bet. He does, making it 4,000 to go. I raise it to 12,000. He calls, there are no draws to speak of showing on the board, so I think he might have an Ace perhaps with a better kicker, or maybe flopped a set. He should have let go of any other pair.