The Hiatus is over!

Well, we are finally back. I have the external VPN set up at home so I can access blogspot, youtube, and many other sites without them being blocked.

So many things to talk about over the last 2 months. Things have gotten better since the last post on Sept 26 - that's the good news. The problem with not posting for that long is that the experiences that seem so fresh,so new at the time are not routine. For instance, listening to Ryan Seacrest in the car to soccer yesterday on a Beijing radio station - so what? But Layup thinks that is newsworthy. Oh well - there you go!

We'll start off with everyone's favorite topic - gambling! We got away for the weekend 2 weeks ago and took a trip to Macau for 2 nights. We stayed at the Venetian and it was great! Warren was crying the second night because "I don't want to leave! Can't we stay here forever??" Sounds like me on the Sunday night of the Vegas trip! (I'm getting him trained early).

First, let me just say that I spent more time doing "recreational" activities on this trip - like taking the canal ride, shopping, mini golf - than in the last 10 Vegas trips combined. I gambled for about 5 hours total over 2 days. Just enough to whet the appetite, but leave you hungry for more.

I mostly played craps. Some random notes about the craps experiences:

- Huge casino; at least, oh, 50 baccarat tables that were open (and 50 more that were not), 20 SicBo, 10 roulette, 30 blackjack - and 2 craps. Just not that popular.
- The minimums were $100 HK. The ratio is about 8 HK$ to 1 US$ - so it's just a tad more expensive than a $10 US craps table. But it plays with your mind! I have $120 on the 6 and 8 - I win a few times - now what? Press to..........$150? $210? ok. What do I win on those? Quick!
- The language spoken by most of the players there is Cantonese, not Mandarin. So that threw me at the beginning. I would be asking for a "liu" (6) and a "ba" (8) - and I was corrected by this older man who said the numbers were "lo" (6) and "bat" (8). I eventually also learned that "gong" is Cantonese for face card (handy at the blackjack table). So my three word vocabulary in Cantonese is solely because of gambling.
- The language got me in trouble later - I wanted to do my patented "Horn High Ace Deuce" bet on the come out. So I try to be nice and throw the $100 in and say "Horn High San", where San is Mandarin for 3. Well, that got them all confused. They don't know "san", and put the chip on the horn high 12. I said "no, no - san! San!" and there was all sorts of confusion. I finally said "3" - and they put in on the right spot.
The dealer then calmly said "next time, just say "Horn High Ace Deuce" - we understand that!"
- The betting behavior at the table was extremely odd. If there were 10 people at the table, you would have:
2 people betting on the pass line
all 10 on the numbers
5 of them betting on the numbers would have them working on the come out roll
0 people betting the come
0 people betting the hardways

and of those 10, 8 would not be at the table 20 minutes from now.

oh, and 15 people would crowd at each far end of the table to watch. It's a fascination to many Chinese casino attendees.

- That betting behavior led to this wild story. So there's like 4 people at the table - I think this was 8 in the morning or so, when I was pissed after the Browns 26-20 OT loss to the Jets. The table was choppy, and this man was constatnly betting the numbers - and they were always ON.
The dice came to him - and the dealers said that if he wants to roll, he has to put a pass line bet down. He grudgingly did.

First rolls - 8 - then several numbers, then an 8! Winner!
Next: 5 - more numbers, then a 5! Two points!
Next: 10 - more numbers, then a 10!
It was getting hot....I was winning the pass line and the 6 and 8, and he was winning a fortune on the numbers.
Next: 8 again - more numbers - then another 8! Woo hoo!

Next: 7 on the pass line - winner!
The shooter - of course - won his minimal $100 pass line, but lost his numbers. He was pressing a bit and had some money out there - maybe $500 on each number. But he had already made a very nice profit to that point.

He paused for about 10 seconds.

"Color up" he said.

I think I said, out loud - "You CAN'T COLOR UP NOW! You're hot!" He didn't hear or understand me.

I was dumbfounded. The dice - in the middle of a hot roll - passed to me. Of course, you know what happened. 6, 7 out.

I am still in shock that he picked up while rolling.

- If any of you ever come out here, I am sure we will have a mini golf competition. It is a 36 hole course that is wild - the holes are about 20-40 meters long; they do not have those stupid boards on the sides of the holes. The course is built on the roof of the casino. It took Freddie, Warren and I 1 full hour to play 18. And the greens are tough and undulating. I can't wait to go back. The only person I know that would have a chance to hit par on this course is Kermit.

The picture above is the approach to the 10th green, I think. You can see Freddie in the background - he hit his approach over the green; that's not where you want to be, as seen by the slope of the green.

All grass in that photo is artificial, by the way.