The Rise and Fall in Atlantic City

I left Hillsborough around 2pm for the trip to Atlantic City. The ride went quickly thanks to Ron and Fez til 3 and then Opie and Anthony the rest of the way. All the Harrah's properties are offering free parking for Total Rewards cardholders so I parked in the Showboat garage without any (direct) cost.

I checked into my room in the newly remodeled Bourbon Tower and took the elevator up to the sixth floor. The past few times I stayed at Showboat, I was in the Orleans Tower because it is the newer of the two. It turns out these rooms are probably even nicer with a large sitting area, king size bed, huge bathroom and plasma tv.

I grabbed my camera and headed out to the boardwalk to take some photos before the sun completely set. The boardwalk was pretty empty due to the cold temperatures and the fact that it is early December and walking on the beach in the winter is not all that popular. I had the beach to myself as I took some shots of the low tide, birds, rocks, the abandoned amusement pier, etc.

I stopped in one of the few shops open for dinner. Who can pass up hotdogs for 99 cents apiece? Along with an order a fries, I sat in the store wondering about the employee and assumed owner. How does he make enough money during the winter to keep things going? Does he operate a loss now and earn enough profit in the summer to stay afloat? An obviously homeless man came in to buy a hotdog and coffee. Mental illness was clear as he made his way past me to use the restroom. I considered paying for his items on my way out of the shop while he was in the bathroom but ended up not doing it. I am not sure what stopped me.

Thirsty, I wandered next door into a souvenir type store advertising two sodas for .99. There were a handful of people there. I ended up buying a caffeine-infused Powerade for .60 or so. The guy behind me in line saw my gloves and asked if I'd bought them in the store (I hadn't). After I left the shop I saw that he was one of the carriage pushers on the Atlantic City boardwalk and wasn't wearing any gloves. Like in the food store, I considered going back and giving him my gloves as he'd be outside in freezing temperatures all night and could surely use them more than I. Again, though, something held me back.

Once inside, I finally made my way to the casino floor. I sat down at a World Series of Poker slot machine, inserted $20 and, like magic, printed out a ticket for $325 less than 30 minutes later. This is the most I'd ever one in a single sitting. I should have quit.

Instead, I decided to enter the 7pm no-limit poker tournament. I wanted to play from the get-go, but wasn't too keen on putting up the $65 it costs to enter. Seeing as how I was playing with house money, I went for it. This was only my second casino hold-em tournament. The first time, I played with Dave quite awhile back now, and was so nervous I was going to mess up that I messed up and was out pretty early. This time, I made it through almost four hours of the tournament and finished in 12th place out of 65. I didn't make any major blunders throughout the tournament and am pretty happy with how I finished although only the top six got paid.

I wandered around the casino floor playing a variety of slot machines and lost a little bit of the money but went to bed still up a pretty good amount.

This morning, I woke up in a fright that I was on some kind of organized group travel program (think JFMF) and had missed my transportation out of Atlantic City. I realized the reality and went back to bed only to experience the same thing again. So at 6am, I headed into the casino and did very poorly, giving them back most of the money I'd won last night.

In the end, I left close to even which is fine when you factor in two meals, tips, the hotel cost, etc. I had a good time and regained some of that living on the road feeling I'm missing from Japan.

On the way home from AC, I pulled off into a scenic overlook area on I-295. I'd stopped there once or twice before when I used to visit Liz at The College of New Jersey when I was at UD. I walked through some of the trails and took a couple pictures too. With the sun shining, the cold wasn't so bad.