impotent. I couldn’t get the money out when I had an advantage. That was a bust. It occurred to me that this would be interesting cover with some training. A companion who changes your bet with various excuses. It wouldn’t look one bit like counting.

This was her first casino visit. But by an odd coincidence, a couple years later she became a dancer at the Sands in Vegas.

The Companion That Wasn’t

This was a five-day trip, and I wish it had been shorter. One of those trips where variance was against me most every day. I called it quits, but remembered that a friend had asked me to bet $5 on 22 at the Roulette table. And so that was my last bet of the trip. You guessed it; the bet won paying 35:1.

This same girl had related a story about her grandmother’s one Las Vegas visit. Waiting in a long line to see Tony Bennett (or some such singer, I forget), she became bored and dropped a few coins into a slot machine. She won a six-figure jackpot. People came streaming out of the woodwork with cameras and IRS forms. The casino obviously wants all the publicity it can get out of a large payoff and the process is not quick. Now, she was in her 80s and the money was not as important to her as seeing the show. She complained that she just wanted to see her Tony. Of course with that payoff, she could hire the guy for an hour. I don’t want to add a note of superstition to this book, but looking back, perhaps I had been selecting the wrong companions for casino visits.

Looking back, I have made three generic mistakes in playing with a companion. The first is lack of a game plan. I tend to act spontaneously. That’s fine if you are on your own. But if you are going to play with or even just bring along a companion, you need to have a serious discussion and agreement about roles well before entering the casino. I am not talking about team play, but bringing along a non-counting spouse, “significant other,” or “arm candy.”

The second mistake is failing to warn companions of the rollercoaster ride. Flying a commercial airliner is said to consist of hours of boredom punctuated by moments of stark terror. A companion should understand that you can play an hour in a six-

 © 2009 Norman Wattenberger