There were billboards all along the route, telling us about how much money the casino paid out. “Our slots pay out 5 million daily.”

“Yeah but they take in 6 million a day,” James blurted out.

The over/under on billboards was 25 and the trip took 23 billboards. I had taken the over and it was as if the gambling gods were telling me to quit while I was ahead and just spend the day in the lazy river.

I didn’t listen

The building itself was completely out of place, in the vast, seemingly lifeless swampland of southern Louisiana; it was the tallest thing for miles. From a distance its purple tinted windows and stucco blurred and waved as the heat of the sun baked the land around it. The Lauberge du Lac, it’s called. (If I had to guess I’d say it’s French for “Welcome Stupid”)

We got there and checked in. The room was nice but I didn’t see much of it. We were in and out, long enough to drop a bag. Then we hit the floor.

The casino was an acid trip, a completely spontaneous situation. The tourettes-inspired carpet and the seizure-producing lights and sounds were, not going to lie, pretty cool. I was swallowed up in the atmosphere.

“Time to work the slots,” I said.

The slots worked me.

Mark and James had given me $150 for the sole purpose of gambling it away if I so chose.  That was my pay for the “work” I’d done with them at the shop. Family pay, I called it. 

It was gone quick, like three hours. I had only been playing nickel slots the whole time and had run it all the way down to about $40. Where the hell was my beginner’s luck?

I went to the ATM and got $40 more. I wasn’t exactly sure what it would do for me but I needed to have the feeling of cash in my pocket. The receipt said I had roughly 50 cents left in my checking account.

“Ewwwww, not good,” I thought. “I better play it smart and win all my money back.”

(Now remember, I haven’t had a job all summer and just blew almost all the money I had “earned” in a three-hour span. You would think that common sense would take over at some point but it never did. A casino is the place where common sense goes to die.)

“How you doin’ on money?” James asked me.

“Ummm…I got 40 bucks cash, plus about 40 left on this voucher,” I said.

“Well, we’re pretty low too,” he said. “Lets get some dinner before we spend the rest our money.”

After dinner, I worked the $40 up to $80 over the next hour or so and then, promptly lost it all in about 10 minutes. I fed a $20 into the devil machine and in another five minutes that was gone, too.

I had given up. I took my last $20 and went looking for James and Charlotte. They were out, too.

I handed the $20 to James and we went to the nearest dollar slots. The second pull landed a $100 jackpot.

Finally our luck was turning. We stayed at that dollar slot machine and paid for two-dollar pulls until all that money was gone again.

“I’m going’ to bed,” Charlotte said.

The smart one went to bed while my degenerate cousin and I decided how we might be able to get more money.

“Well, I think there is a fifty in the ash tray in the car,” he said. “But Charlotte would kill me.”

“Wait, can you use a SEARS card in an ATM?” I asked frantically, going through my wallet.

“No, you idiot.”

“Wait, I got an idea,” I said. “I’ve only got about 50 cents left in my checking account but I think I saw where you can do cash advances.”

I was almost giddy as a swiped my card and got a $100 advance… on my debit card.  I purposefully went into the red on my checking account in order to gamble more. Seriously, who does that?

I took the printout to the cashier; she had me sign some stuff, then inked my thumb and made me push it down on the paper.

“Great,” I thought. “For all of eternity my thumbprint will live in a back room at the Lauberge du Lac.”

I imagined it hung on some corkboard in the back where the casino employees could look at it on a coffee break for a good laugh.