I WON...AGAIN

   I eat at the casino 2 or 3 times a week. It's good food and a good price.

   Every Wednesday is senior day. Your meal is $10.00. They have one western dish and one Chinese dish you get to choose from. 

   Business on Wednesday is great as the seniors like the food and price. 

   On Wednesday there is always a draw for $500.00. I have won this draw 3 times in the last 7 years. 

   Today they phoned me and I had won the Father's day draw which is a variety of things worth $500.00. Now one thing is a golf package and I don't golf. 

    So a phone call like this just made my day. 

LUCK

      There's an old Jewish proverb that I like. When you can , hang around the lucky. At times I've taken the liberty to change lucky to some other word. 

     I eat at the Casino two or three times a week. They have good food and it's a good price. Breakfast is seven bucks. They have a senior day when it's a two for one until 7:00 PM. 

    Now I don't gamble. Quite a few seniors take advantage of the food but don't gamble. 

    Each week they have a senior draw for $500.00 . There are other draws which are all free to enter once a day. Every two weeks they have a $500.00 shopping draw. 

    Well , last week the Micro manager won the senior draw! The next day they phoned me to tell me that I had won ear buds! I didn't know how I won the ear buds. There were 40 separate prizes besides the shopping spree. 

     So we've been lucky. So hang around my blog. 

BUMBLING , FUMBLING GAMBLER

         Now I don't gamble! 

         But I do eat at a casino where the food is excellent and cheap. 

        However, some time ago the casino persuaded me to get a loyalty card. It saved me 2 bucks on the buffet. I thought nothing more about it. 

       So a year after I get a promo saying they hadn't seen any action in my account and here's 20 bucks in points to play with. A couple of weeks ago they gave me another 20000 points. You can only gamble with your points and any money comes from what you win. 

     So I got one of the staff to help me spend my points. It's complicated . You have an account...news to me. You put your pin number in and it tells you how much you have to play with. I'm not sure of all the steps and I couldn't do it myself. However, you choose how big your bets should be and then start hitting play until  3 figures come up in a row. Then they decide how much money you get? How they figure that out I don't know.

     However, one hit came up and I won $43.00. I immediately cashed it out and kept playing. They couldn't take my $43.00 away as I wouldn't play with it. I continued playing until all my points were used up. The machine shows you how much you have to play with and when it's all used up. 

    The Micro Manager played and she won $12.50. We cashed in and went home. 

    Does this make a gamble of me? Never! Am I tempted? Never. You feel silly and angry that you put money in the machines. 

    So the bumbling gambler, with a lot of help from the staff,  played his points and went home still not knowing how to run the machines. 

Casino Nights

    I had written a post two years ago about my connection to Casinos. So when I mentioned casinos in my last post some of you started to wonder if I was a gambling, partying fool of some kind. I don't gamble. I take an occasional drink. I'm not a night owl or a partier. 

    I work a couple of Casinos every two or three years for an organization that has charitable status. In Alberta , charities can get an opportunity to raise funds from Casino profits that go to the government.

   So  the charity gets a couple of nights at the Casino and have to work for the funds they will be given. As I said before, it's kind of a make work project for the charities. I'm sure they'd be happier with full time staff doing the job we do.

    We work with the table operations...blackjack, roulette. We are in a separate room from the Casino. We have a banker, cashier, general manager and a chip runner. We sign for a certain amount of money and chips. The money is counted and the chips are counted. When a table needs chips they put in an order to our banker. The chips are sold to the players at the table. When someone has chips to cash in they come to us and we redeem their chips. We start out with roughly 150 000 in chips and cash. At the end of the night counters count all the chips and cash from the tables. The chips come back and are used the next day again. I'm not sure of the procedure with the money from the tables.

    The slots are all electronic so humans don't have to  count and distribute money. 90% of a charities money comes from the slots and 10% from the tables.

    So what was I doing until 2:30 AM? Well counting money and chips. It's not fast paced and is a lot of fun. They have a system for operating this procedure.

    I think I'd have a tough time to find anything more boring than slot machines. Gambling holds no interest for me. 

    One guy cashed in chips for $1600.00. He told us he spent $3000.00 to get the $1600.00. I would rather spend the $3000.00 for travel.

   I don't find the late hours a problem and I get to work with fun people from my group. 

   So now you know that I haven't fallen off the deep end and become a complete fool.

Working at the Casino

       For the past few days I have worked a shift at the Casino on behalf of a non-profit group that I am involved with. I have previously posted on "hooked on Casinos" where I maintain that non profit groups depend  heavily on Casinos for funding.


     In Alberta a nonprofit organization can be "given" a Casino to work at for two days. Over the two days thirteen people are required to cover all shifts. The two days will give about $25000 for the organization. My shifts started at 7:30 PM and ended about 2:30 AM. I find the work interesting as there's always something new to learn. Working with your team and the adviser is fun. The system set up to operate the tables is amazing for the sets of checks and balances that regulate the flow of cash and chips. Both nights we balanced exactly.


    The casino consists of slot machines and gaming tables. Charitable groups work on the gaming table aspect of the casino operation. For gaming tables chips are used for the play. A player buys chips at the table to play the game. Somebody has to tightly control the cash and the chips. That's where we come in. Let's say the  casino has $200000 in cash. They also the same value of  chips. Groups provide a banker, manager, cashier and chip runner. An extremely capable advisor tells us exactly what to do. All this is done with computer transactions. I was a banker...the guy who looks after all cash and chips. When I start the previous banker transfers all chips and cash to me. I give the cashier about $10000 to pay people who bring chips for redemption. When more chips are needed at the tables I also fill out chip orders. The tables need more chips when players take their chips and cash them in. The banker gives the chips to a "chip runner" who takes the chips to a table that needs chips. The manager supervises and relieves other workers. So the operation works very smoothly under the expert advice of your advisor. At the end of my shift I had to balance the cash with the chips. An able advisor really makes you look good. Also at the end of my shift I trans fer all cash and chips that  were in play to the count room which does the official count. 


     Now the group puts their time in so that they jump though some hoops to justify getting a bundle of money for the charity. Two and a half year later we get to do this all over again.

Hooked on Casinos

      Now I don't gamble! So this does not cover a personal story of a gambling problem.


      My concern is the other side of gambling where organizations depend on funds from casinos.


     When Alberta legalized gambling and casinos were set up, charitable organizations complained as it would kill the bingo cash cow. Therefore, the Alberta Govt. set up a system where groups needing funds could volunteer in the casino and receive funds for their efforts. It's a good deal for non profits as for two days of effort you receive $20 000 to $30 000. You only get a casino once every two years so it's popular and why not?


      I am on the board of an organization which has a casino. Why there's a bee in my bonnet is because we've recently been working on two casino reports which we must complete. The first report is an accounting of what we have done with casino money. We have to keep a separate casino account. The people who want the report decided the period should be from part of 2009, all of 2010 and part of 2011. So we had to go through files from 3 different years...not fun! It doesn't make you happy when the report is returned and they want different information.


     Now because we have an upcoming casino, we must file a detailed budget of what we are going to spend the money on and the approximate time it will be spent. Most organizations have one big item to spend their money on and it's done. We have many smaller and different  events. One thing we do is  present about 8 speakers a year. We really have to work to get the Alberta Liquor and Gaming Commission to accept speakers. 


    So the two days of working at the casino are a piece of cake. The book work is a pain in the butt. You are limited in what the money can be spent on. It would be easier if you could spend the money on any of your groups on going activities.


    Organizations have become dependent on casino funds. Your group is put in a schedule for a casino date.  Other fund raising activities have become less lucrative so we  work hard at participating in casinos.


     So guess what? I will continue working to raise income from casinos???