Meet me at Foxwoods ~

After commuting a billion hours a week and working my ass off eleven hours a day, Friday's don't even count as weekends. I'm not prepared to do anything daring on Saturday, except maybe go to Milford for a delicious dinner of sushi. That leaves Sunday as the only day I really have the energy to go out and play… but I have to be home damn early to go to bed and rest up for yet another week of work.

And that's why I love long weekends. Sunday's just another Saturday. Seizing the opportunity, yesterday I found myself Foxwoods bound.

I'll tell you - as my first casino experience, I was impressed. Glitter and gold, excitement and music. They are built like a maze, trapping you in and leading you down roads of possibility and despair…. And it's true, the house always wins.

But it doesn't take the fun away. Diaz tried to teach me craps - but it's beyond me. Roulette, on the other hand, I can handle. As I stood by watching the black and red colors spin endlessly, draining money away from poor, desperate saps, the man in charge - decked in suit and tie and looking awfully regal, shouted out: “Come on Lady Luck! Miss, miss - what color's it gonna be?”

I was so infatuated by the shiny objects jiggling in his hand that it took a couple seconds before I realized he was talking to me. “I'm sorry, what?!”

He laughed. “If you had 1,000 imaginary dollars to bet on red or black, which would you put it all on?”

Trying to recover from my apparent stupidity, I blurted out - with confidence, of course - “Black!” - and instantly regretted it. Red's my favorite color, man.

“Are you sure?”

No point in going back now. “Yes.”

“Positively sure?”

Hell, it's fake money. “Absolutely, positively.”

“And black it will be!” And the people with actual money put little toy chips on colors and numbers, bidding real dollars on whatever they're instincts told them. Then the nice man in the suit jiggled the marbles in his hand one last time and tossed one ever so casually into the spinning basin of corresponding colors and numbers.

And as the tiny ball stopped skipping its shallows wells and settled in on one number, it chose black 17.

The man in the suit looked at me with that big, bold Vegas-style smile and laughed. “Now you've got 2,000 imaginary dollars! Cash out and go home!”

I shook my head. “If only it was that easy!”

His eyes sparkled. “You're good luck miss.” The way these dealers smile… it seduces you into the gambling world. “Go have fun!”

And fun I had. Crappy little Foxwoods left me yearning for a real Vegas vacation…
Now wouldn't that be fun?