Lou Lou in Las Vegas

[zanemay]

[i have written about Lou Lou before. She's my 52-looks-35 year old Caribbean girl friend. Almost 7 years now. Doing just great 2 years after kidney transplant. Queen of the Slot Machine.]

 

?There?s no place I want to go less than Las Vegas.? I remember saying that just before we left. ?I?m going to be grumpy the whole time.? I didn't have time to go, she didn't have time to go and we had gone to LV about 2 years ago. I thought that was a lifetime supply. But LL had plane tickets left over from a falling out she had with a friend who was supposed to go with her a few months ago. Now I was stuck. "I'm going and you're going with me! I'm not going to lose these tickets." she said.

 

I certainly got off to a grumpy start. LL had booked us into a hotel called the Econolodge for my sake since I was paying for lodging because she had paid the airfare. You have to catch an Airport Shuttle to get to ?The Strip? in LV, and you have to wait outside for it. It was 105 degrees. That made us both grumpy. Then when the first shuttle arrived where we had been told to wait, the driver said he wasn?t going way up to the Econolodge. ?Go back across the street and have them call dispatch.? That made us more grumpy! LL had been told that the Econolodge was ?right across the street from the Stratosphere? and the Stratosphere Casino was definitely on the strip, so why wasn?t the shuttle going there? But LL went over and talked to them in the booth and eventually a shuttle arrived. The driver made a big deal out of going to the Econolodge and said something quite loud about ?the ghetto.? Embarrassing. Everyone else was going to a strip hotel and we were going to the Econo Ghetto Lodge. Also add ?anxious? to ?grumpy.? We were afoot and would have to navigate the ghetto!?

 

So after stopping at the beautiful Stratosphere we drove another six blocks to the Econolodge. It wasn?t right across the street from the Stratosphere, but it was right across the street from the Adult Superstore. When I went to ice machine a fellow pulled up and tried to sell me a Rolex. Crap! After a meal of Thai food and a nap, we made went for our evening walk to the Stratosphere and then on about another mile and a half to the Flamingo where LL wanted to play the slots. Not far from our hotel we encountered a couple of guys having a knock-down fight out in the street ? that?s Las Vegas Boulevard, three lanes each way ? with cars swerving around them. We did stop at the Roxy Café in the Stratosphere for a salad and that was fun. There was a DJ playing 60?s music and all the staff wore very retro Diner outfits and hairdo?s. From time to time they would perform, singing and dancing on the counter. That was a first for me and it was really fun. Our moods took a small upswing.

 

Not that she goes to LV very often, but she does have ?her machines? in the Flamingo. She played two side-by-side Blazing Seven dollar machines, three dollars a spin. I removed from the area as I knew that if she didn?t win, my aura of pessimism would be blamed. I came back after about half an hour. She had hit $1,000 jackpots on both machines and now had serious play money. She stopped around midnight and we went to VIP (she has VIP status of course) services to see about getting a safe deposit box as we didn?t want to carry the then $3,000 back to the Econolodge. (?Ghetto? was a big exaggeration on the part of the loud-mouth shuttle driver, but still, there was no safe in the room and the area and the guests were a bit dodgy.) The VIP host checked her play and of course wanted to take care of cute little Lou Lou. Safe deposit boxes were only available in the rooms. ?Here?s what I?ll do. You stay in your hotel tonight and I can give you a room for tomorrow and the next night. Come back after you play tomorrow and I?ll tell you if I can comp both nights or just tomorrow. Would you like that?? With $3,000 of LL?s money in my pocket ? I?m her banker ? and a VIP room booked for the remainder of our trip all grumpiness was gone, baby, gone! We hopped on the bus back to our humble quarters.

 

The next morning I was up at 5AM and out for an hour walk. Then a second sleep with The Gambler and then off to the Flamingo. I took the bags to our room and LL went to her machines. I went into support mode, bringing LL whatever snacks she needed, holding her machines when she went to the toilet and, most importantly, cashing out her winnings and tucking them away in the room safe. Only I have the combination. She makes a commitment that what she gives me is going home. Once I take it, it is definitely going home, because she won?t see it until we check out. But this time, there was no problem at all with money, she kept playing and winning. Late in the evening we went back to see Ralph, the oh-so-helpful VIP host, now ?her host.? He checked LL?s play ? 16 hours (although I had a couple on the quarter machines mostly with money LL gave me, and playing on her card so all the time was credited to her.) After that visit with Ralph everything was comp-ed ? the room, all meals and a visit to the gym.

 

When we left, LL had netted $6,500 out of which she gave me about $1,500. I also won a bit. She went home with $5k and I went home with $2k, both in the best of moods and of course I agreed to return to LV as her escort / consort someday in the not-too-distant future.

 

I had two particular pleasures at the hotel. One was going off my diet to eat the desserts at the buffet. I didn?t indulge during our first meal, but I did during the next two. Anything else would be stupid. These are all fresh-baked pies and cakes. Very gourmet chocolate. I didn?t go overboard, but this was my first time astray into the world of refined sugar in six months.

 

I also went to the gym which had top-of-the-line sauna and Jacuzzi rooms. Just a handful of guests at the time. A tile sauna, a wooden sauna and a steam sauna. Cold, warm, and hot jacuzzi?s. All facilities spotless and beautiful. They have to be. They have everything in every casino. Why what if they didn?t have a sauna and I went to the casino next door to take one? What if I played a little slot machine while I was passing through and hit a little jackpot? I might think I was in a new lucky environment never return. Can?t have the players wandering off with their money.

 

I also got a look at the underbelly of Sin City. It is quite the sleaze capitol and full of sleazy, overheated residents selling Rolex watches, drugs or their bodies and running every other kind of game. There are lots and lots of boarded-up apartment buildings and hotels - now hotels for the homeless who pry off the boards. The abandoned buildings line quiet streets behind the strip hotels, and there is plenty of parking for visitors who would rather sleep in a van than shell out for a room.