Harrahs (now Caesars) Entertainment is where I spend most of my gambling dollars because they have so many properties and my play is combined at all of the properties to determine my player status.
There are four player levels (not counting, I'm sure, the high rollers "whales" and such): Gold Players are pretty much everyone who sets foot in one of their casinos -- as soon as you sign up you are a Gold Player and maintain that level until you have a higher yearly coin in. Spend $40,000 (video poker) in a year and you become Platinum; spend $110,000 in a year and you are accorded Diamond status. Seven Stars is the highest but they don't advertise how much you have to spend to get that level.
The "spending" levels listed are for video poker players which is what I play primarily; slot machine players need to only have half that amount spent in a year.
Keep in mind that the machines are tracking COIN IN which is naturally much higher than what a person is physically taking out of their wallet. For example, if I put a $20 bill in a 25 cent video poker machine, I have paid for 16 hands (at $1.25 per hand). However, during those 16 hands I will have won or broken even on about 95% of them so for $20 I might be able to play 30, 40 or even more hands (especially if I hit a 4 of a kind or some other high paying win). Assuming I keep playing until I lose the original $20 I could realistically run through $100-$200 which all counts toward your player score but is still just the $20 I initially put into the machine.
Okay, so back to my status. For a long time I was platinum which was good enough for me because it was better than my pals had (LOL!) and it pretty much guaranteed me a comp room any time I wanted to visit AC.
But then somehow I got an offer to be flown out for a 4 day weekend at Harrahs Reno. We thought it would be pretty cool to do that since we hadn't been there together since 1984ish so I RSVPd Yes. In the meantime, between the RSVP and the actual arrival in Reno, I hit Diamond status! So my first time as a Diamond player would be in Reno and I didn't really know what to expect from that but I thought it would be pretty cool and I was right!
At check in the guy told me the hours of the Diamond Lounge and I wasn't overly impressed because once before a long time ago I got a Free Pass to go to the Diamond Lounge (or whatever they called it) at the Tropicana and when I went in it was just a private gambling salon with machines I couldn't afford to play anyway. But I figured I would show Mike the lounge when we got a chance.
Of course our first order of business, (after taking care of other business ;) was to find a cocktail waitress and a loose machine. After playing for a little while a floor worker came over, "Linda? Here is a voucher for the two of you to have dinner at the buffet" Okay, cool, free food for the diamond player, I'm not complaining! So I found Mike and when we went to the buffet I discovered that even better than the free food was the Diamond Player line pass! That meant that no matter how many people were on line for the buffet, as soon as I came to the Diamond Line, they would immediately come over to me, grab a set up from a different area (linen napkins for the diamonds!) and escort us to a private dining area inside the buffet itself. Diamonds also have their choice of cocktails inside their private area! Very, very cool and the food was very, very good!
That first night, coming out of the buffet, I noticed a partially hidden door on the side wall with a small placard stating "Diamond Club". I said to Mike, let me show you what I mean about the high limit slot room. Boo-ya I was totally off the mark. The Diamond Lounge here is a small, intimate space with soft couches, low lighting, club and pub tables, a roaring fireplace, cozy bar, tuxedo'd host and a small snack buffet. Basically a place to get away from it all. Very very nice! We ended up spending part of every day/night here just chilling with drinks, watching tv or reading the newspapers, etc.
For breakfast/lunch we decided to try the generic cafe and here, too, there was a separate entrance for Diamonds with a dedicated host to guarantee no wait, and a separate room for dining.
Meanwhile, every day a casino floor clerk would come to find me, "Linda? Here is a voucher for the two of you to visit the buffet for dinner" It was really nice to be treated so royally! So on the last night, when the casino floor clerk came over "Linda....." I basically waved him off nicely, hardly taking my eyes off my machine, "oh, thanks anyway but we're leaving in the morning so we won't be here to eat tomorrow" The gentleman replied, "I'm the Casino Host" That is when I realized he wasn't a generic casino worker. Basically what had happened was that since I was Platinum when I booked, and then turned Diamond before I got there, nobody had alerted him that I was there so he was falling all over himself apologizing for not having done anything for me!! I'm telling him not to worry about it, everything was perfect, but he's trying to figure out how he can make it up to me now that it's midnight and we're leaving in like 6 hours :P So he's offering to have some midnight snack delivered to my room?!?! No, thanks anyway but I won't be in my room LOL. So then he says, well at the very least I'm going to have a limo pick you up and bring you to the airport in the morning. Very very cool!!!
Mike's not into the frills but I totally loved being a Diamond in Reno!
Now, I get back home and my first visit to AC as a Diamond occurs in December when I went down with Jean. The whole car ride down I'm telling her about all the Diamond perks and how great it is being a diamond and how much fun we're going to have getting the "treatment"...... wow, was I sadly mistaken!
Apparently there isn't much $$$ in Reno where being a Diamond means you are big fish in a small bowl....in AC everyone and their mother is a diamond!! There are no line passes because the lines for Diamond Players are longer than any other. In fact, when I went to check in at the hotel, there was NOBODY on the "regular patron" line, but 8 people in front of me on the Diamond Line!! Where's the benefit there??
So I said to Jean, well we'll at least get to visit the Diamond Lounge - wait til you see how cool this place is. NOT! The Diamond Lounge here is the size of a school cafeteria and yes there is more food choices than just the snacky-snacks in Reno, it is a huge cavernous space with regular dining tables like a restaurant, loud, lots of wait staff, hustle/bustle, bright, takes a while to get a drink, that sort of thing. Hmmmmm....well at least the food was free and the tables by the front windows had a very nice view overlooking the boardwalk and ocean. But not quite the elite status I experienced in Reno.
Oh, well, apparently in Atlantic City you're nobody until you carry Seven Stars status....I'll be glad to visit Reno again in a couple of weeks!
Sunday
Mike Breaks The Streak
As most of our friends already know, Mike is less than "lucky" when it comes to the casino. In fact, I usually bring him along and then set him up in the spa for the day to chill out listening to his I-pod, hanging around in his robe, soaking in the calderium or frigidarium, while munching on some fruit and sipping some flavored tea. He's my manly man!
Anyway, Mike does like to play video poker, BUT he only likes winning. Now, of course, everyone WANTS to win...but some people, like yours truly, get gratification just from playing and the win is a bonus. Mike, on the other hand, gets no joy from playing but is looking for the big kahuna. In addition, he has decided that single hand video poker just doesn't give him enough of a "rush" so he has been playing triple hand video poker. This means that instead of losing $1.25 a hand, he is losing $3.75! Put another way, he loses his money three times as quickly! I try to convince him to play nickels or dimes when playing 3 hands but he counters that the win wouldn't mean as much. (So true...but the loss would take longer!)
Okay, so bottom line is that he doesn't get the chance to gamble very often but I got another one of those "Mystery Envelope" invitations recently and since he is always my first choice for a traveling companion I asked him if he'd like to come along. Cathy booked me a room at Caesars and upon arrival I set him up with a spa day (using my comps) figuring that would keep him occupied and out of the casino.
And it did....until he got tired of lounging around..... and went in search of a video poker machine he'd "like".
Now, even though Mike doesn't gamble very often, he has gambled quite a bit in the almost 30 years we've been together and he has only once hit the elusive big daddy of all poker hands: the Royal Flush. A fact of which he reminds me constantly; to which I reply, "well at least your not Donna". Donna who is one of my oldest and dearest friends has been playing video poker as long as I have and the poor thing has never even hit one!
So, it's Saturday night and we have enjoyed a light dinner in the Diamond Lounge (more about that in the next post). It is now around 8pm and I want to head downstairs to try my luck at the progressive video poker bank that I like (it was over $1300 yesterday when it was hit by someone - not me - and now it has climbed back up to the $1200 mark). Mike tells me he is going to finish his glass of wine and then go up to bed. I head downstairs, find a machine and then remember that I left my cell phone in the room so I figure I better run up and tell Mike not to try calling me. Back up to the Diamond Lounge and Mike isn't there!! Hmmmm, he must've drank that wine pretty quickly, right? Wrong! Coming out of the Diamond Lounge I see him at a bank of Super Times Pay machines!!! Yikes! If you think the triple play machines make you go through your money quickly, these Super Times Pay machines are even worse. They are fun to play, but you have to bet 6 coins per hand - minimum 18 coins because you have to play at least 3 hands. The pays are the same so even if you get a three of a kind it still only pays 15 so you lose 3 coins on a hand you'd normally triple your bet on. The beauty of these machines is that there is a wild multiplier card that sometimes comes up and you have the chance to win 2, 3, 5, 8 or even 10 times the regular pay. That is what you are paying the extra coins for. Volatile?? You bet!
And here is my darling husband, drinking wine, betting $4.50 a hand....and you just know he is going to be steaming mad when he loses his money!
I remind him that we are leaving early in the morning, that he is already tired, that he should go to bed, yada yada yada...and I head back downstairs to my progressive video poker machines.
Time goes by, as it always does in the casino, and I feel someone touching the back of my head -- it's Mike! Oh, no, I say "is it morning already? is it time to leave?" He's laughing, "no, I haven't been to bed yet!" WHAT??? My husband never stays up later than 11 and that's only in a very extreme circumstance. If he's awake at 9pm he's hours past his bedtime!!! Well, it turns out he has finally broken his "can't get a royal streak" because he has hit not one but TWO royals on the same machine within an hour!!!
Insane that he stayed up all night -- but way to go Mike!
By the way, I hit one also, jackpot of $1362 on the same machine that I hit in December. This time it was a sequential Royal flush in spades (too bad it wasn't on the $25,000 sequential machine) which surprised me because although I was pretty sure I was going to hit one, I thought it would be in clubs for some reason so when I got dealt the center J-Q-K I didn't expect the 10 and Ace to pop up.
Anyway, Mike does like to play video poker, BUT he only likes winning. Now, of course, everyone WANTS to win...but some people, like yours truly, get gratification just from playing and the win is a bonus. Mike, on the other hand, gets no joy from playing but is looking for the big kahuna. In addition, he has decided that single hand video poker just doesn't give him enough of a "rush" so he has been playing triple hand video poker. This means that instead of losing $1.25 a hand, he is losing $3.75! Put another way, he loses his money three times as quickly! I try to convince him to play nickels or dimes when playing 3 hands but he counters that the win wouldn't mean as much. (So true...but the loss would take longer!)
Okay, so bottom line is that he doesn't get the chance to gamble very often but I got another one of those "Mystery Envelope" invitations recently and since he is always my first choice for a traveling companion I asked him if he'd like to come along. Cathy booked me a room at Caesars and upon arrival I set him up with a spa day (using my comps) figuring that would keep him occupied and out of the casino.
And it did....until he got tired of lounging around..... and went in search of a video poker machine he'd "like".
Now, even though Mike doesn't gamble very often, he has gambled quite a bit in the almost 30 years we've been together and he has only once hit the elusive big daddy of all poker hands: the Royal Flush. A fact of which he reminds me constantly; to which I reply, "well at least your not Donna". Donna who is one of my oldest and dearest friends has been playing video poker as long as I have and the poor thing has never even hit one!
And here is my darling husband, drinking wine, betting $4.50 a hand....and you just know he is going to be steaming mad when he loses his money!
I remind him that we are leaving early in the morning, that he is already tired, that he should go to bed, yada yada yada...and I head back downstairs to my progressive video poker machines.
Time goes by, as it always does in the casino, and I feel someone touching the back of my head -- it's Mike! Oh, no, I say "is it morning already? is it time to leave?" He's laughing, "no, I haven't been to bed yet!" WHAT??? My husband never stays up later than 11 and that's only in a very extreme circumstance. If he's awake at 9pm he's hours past his bedtime!!! Well, it turns out he has finally broken his "can't get a royal streak" because he has hit not one but TWO royals on the same machine within an hour!!!
Insane that he stayed up all night -- but way to go Mike!
Had the $10k spent already!
Caesars has become my favorite boardwalk location casino. For a long time it was Showboat, but my last couple of times at Showboat weren't so hot and the room was just "meh" so I've gotten used to Caesars and find that everything I need is right there. They don't do such a great job of cleaning around the slot/video machine areas, and it can sometimes be a while before you get a drink....but they have a decent assortment of the machines I like so I have taken to requesting that property when I contact my lovely player representative (Cathy Cudoni) for a room.
Okay, so anyway, in December I invited Jean to accompany me on an overnight to Caesars when they were having a mystery envelope drawing. This particular promotion is my favorite because the minimum I am guaranteed to win is $100 with a chance of my prize being as high as $10,000!!!!! For this event, my prize was the minimum $100 which was kind of a bummer because all around me people were winning $300, $500, $200....but it was a free (relatively speaking) hundred bucks so I wasn't about to complain. Although I was kind of surprised because I really did have this feeling that I was going to win.
As an aside, I have to point out that a number of thoughts were going through my head when I got the Mystery Envelope invitation. Thoughts like: "how can I go to AC the week before Christmas? I am already spending so much $$$ on Christmas am I crazy to spend money gambling? We're leaving on our big cruise in a few weeks and that's going to be another expense...." thoughts like that. So I had invited Jean, and I had gotten the room, but I kept looking for signs that said I shouldn't go. Instead I kept getting signs every day that said I SHOULD go. Stupid things like I would say to myself, "oh you can't be away you have a group coming in this weekend" and then BAM! the next day I got a phone call from the group asking to reschedule. Then I said to myself, "okay take your coin jar to the bank and if you don't have at least $100 in coins you shouldn't go" so off I go to the bank and BAM! I had $138 in coins! The day I was planning to leave I stopped at the post office, "if I have any bills in my po box I'll call to cancel my room" and BAM! no bills but a check for $2.75 from a class action settlement. So, like I said, stupid things but they all seemed to be pointing me in an AC direction and I could only assume this meant I was destined to win $10,000.
Okay, so we now know I didn't win $10,000 but I had $100 of their money plus $138 of my laundry money (that would be the coins from my coin jar that I have collected from the washer/dryer and not, certainly, laundry money that I need to go to a laundromat and wash clothes -- just in case anyone who is reading this doesn't know me and thinks I would take the family's laundry money to a casino!)
Back to my story....
On this trip, I came across a bank of progressive video poker machines that were as close to full pay as you're ever going to find in Atlantic City and the royal flush prize was over $1400. So I plopped right down and started to play, and play, and play, and play. Hours and hours of video poker, hopping from machine to machine in the bank. Sporadically I took a break and went to the Super Times Pay machines (terrible odds but I can't help myself, I love them!) and the Ultimate X machines (even worse odds and have NEVER won but again they are fun to play). Both of those novelty games suck my money up faster than a....well I don't know what to compare them to; but they sure do suck my money up! This is why I only play them if I am AHEAD -- kind of like a little treat to myself.
So, off and on for that night, the next day and the next night I played to win the progressive Royal Flush -- pretty sure that I was going to hit it, it was just a matter of when and on which machine. Finally, at 5:08am (after staying up all night LOL!) on 12/18, I hit the jackpot for $1881.
I think it was clubs but it might have been diamonds!
Okay, so anyway, in December I invited Jean to accompany me on an overnight to Caesars when they were having a mystery envelope drawing. This particular promotion is my favorite because the minimum I am guaranteed to win is $100 with a chance of my prize being as high as $10,000!!!!! For this event, my prize was the minimum $100 which was kind of a bummer because all around me people were winning $300, $500, $200....but it was a free (relatively speaking) hundred bucks so I wasn't about to complain. Although I was kind of surprised because I really did have this feeling that I was going to win.
As an aside, I have to point out that a number of thoughts were going through my head when I got the Mystery Envelope invitation. Thoughts like: "how can I go to AC the week before Christmas? I am already spending so much $$$ on Christmas am I crazy to spend money gambling? We're leaving on our big cruise in a few weeks and that's going to be another expense...." thoughts like that. So I had invited Jean, and I had gotten the room, but I kept looking for signs that said I shouldn't go. Instead I kept getting signs every day that said I SHOULD go. Stupid things like I would say to myself, "oh you can't be away you have a group coming in this weekend" and then BAM! the next day I got a phone call from the group asking to reschedule. Then I said to myself, "okay take your coin jar to the bank and if you don't have at least $100 in coins you shouldn't go" so off I go to the bank and BAM! I had $138 in coins! The day I was planning to leave I stopped at the post office, "if I have any bills in my po box I'll call to cancel my room" and BAM! no bills but a check for $2.75 from a class action settlement. So, like I said, stupid things but they all seemed to be pointing me in an AC direction and I could only assume this meant I was destined to win $10,000.
Okay, so we now know I didn't win $10,000 but I had $100 of their money plus $138 of my laundry money (that would be the coins from my coin jar that I have collected from the washer/dryer and not, certainly, laundry money that I need to go to a laundromat and wash clothes -- just in case anyone who is reading this doesn't know me and thinks I would take the family's laundry money to a casino!)
Back to my story....
On this trip, I came across a bank of progressive video poker machines that were as close to full pay as you're ever going to find in Atlantic City and the royal flush prize was over $1400. So I plopped right down and started to play, and play, and play, and play. Hours and hours of video poker, hopping from machine to machine in the bank. Sporadically I took a break and went to the Super Times Pay machines (terrible odds but I can't help myself, I love them!) and the Ultimate X machines (even worse odds and have NEVER won but again they are fun to play). Both of those novelty games suck my money up faster than a....well I don't know what to compare them to; but they sure do suck my money up! This is why I only play them if I am AHEAD -- kind of like a little treat to myself.
So, off and on for that night, the next day and the next night I played to win the progressive Royal Flush -- pretty sure that I was going to hit it, it was just a matter of when and on which machine. Finally, at 5:08am (after staying up all night LOL!) on 12/18, I hit the jackpot for $1881.
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