"Those who can, do. Those who can’t, bitch about it on the Internet." -Simon, from The Book of Simon
Some bios list credentials, such as: Education BFA in Illustration, Massachusetts College of Art Occupation Former Production Slave, Ballantine Books Comics Credits Columnist, Writer, Artist, Editor Etc…
And some bios tell a story, such as: I can remember sitting in front of my television one morning, watching the old Batman show, when Julie Newmar appeared in that skintight black leather outfit as Catwoman. It was my first boy/girl thing. >A year later I was in kindergarten telling Katherine Burke that I loved her. It’s pretty much been a string of stupid mistakes ever since…
Still other bios state an intent, such as: This is a series of essays illustrating the life of one particular struggling artist as he plods through the world and occasionally bumps into some interesting shit.
But most bios just sit to the right of the column and are never looked at. So ignore this space and just read the damn column already…
As my sister strolls the Strip in Vegas, I settle for the East Coast’s seashore alternative, Atlantic City. My friend Moby, the last of my friends currently employed, is on vacation this week. He found out about a bus that picks up people everyday at 7:45, right down the street from where we all live. For twenty-four dollars you get roundtrip down to the Monopoly board and then you get fourteen dollars back to gamble with. Pretty solid deal. And that is why Moby, Kahloz, and I found ourselves standing on a corner in Astoria, Queens one frigid Tuesday morning in October. Place your bets.
Landing On Boardwalk The first gamble of the day was whether the damn bus would show up or not. Moby purchased our tickets ahead of time and we arrived fifteen minutes before the scheduled pickup. Almost an hour later and still no sign of the bus. Kahloz asked a guy in the corner store who had a sign for the tour company where the bus was. He assured us it was coming. It finally pulled up around 8:30. By then we were all sufficiently frozen.
As the bus rolled through various neighborhoods in Queens we quickly realized that we were by far the youngest passengers on the trip. The majority of the others hovered around the seventy-plus range, with the exception of two Middle Eastern tourists who sat behind me and spoke at the top of their lungs, non-stop the entire two hours down to South Jersey. I don’t know whether continuous chatter is made even more annoying when you don’t know what the hell they’re saying.
The most vocal of the passengers was an old man I’ve decided to call Walter. You could tell this guy lived on the bus because he knew the route and the stops better than the bus driver. He was a backseat driver of the worst magnitude, barking orders and letting the actual driver know when he should and shouldn’t stop. I hope that when I reach old age my sense of entitlement doesn’t make me into a bossy asshole who feels the need to guide the world when no one has asked me to.
We arrived at the Resorts Hotel and Casino just before noon. They told us to be back by ten after six for the return trip. Moby was our de facto guide, having been to Atlantic City on more than one occasion over the years. With him in the lead we wandered into the nearest casino and began to gamble.
The first thing I noticed was that almost everyone was old. A sense of dread swept over me that this was the future I had to look forward to. The casinos were like living cemeteries; the slot machines lit up like blinking tombstones. Things even went so far as to have cards that you put into the machine, rather than have to keep dumping quarters in. A lot of the people had cords attached to their cards so they wouldn’t lose them. They looked like they were hooked up to an IV and the slot machine was their glucose drip bag. So many similes that thinking of new ones disturbed me.
Within the first hour I was up thirty dollars and decided it wasn’t going to get better than that. I’d come with thirty, expecting to lose it and have to charge lunch. But since I was in the plus category I thought it best to quit while I was ahead. Gambling never held any thrill for me. I worked for years selling lottery and scratch tickets, watching people piss away their money on the slim chance of a payoff. I knew a guy in one town who took in foster kids and spent the bulk of that money on gambling while the seven kids all slept on cots in one room and ate bologna sandwiches everyday for lunch. Much like drug use, any potential fun in gambling was ruined early on for me by witnessing the worst case scenarios. So I took the thirty bucks and put it toward my own vice, an all-you-can-eat lunch buffet at Bally’s Wild West.
You Got To Know When To Fold ‘Em After lunch we spent some time wandering the boardwalk, stopping into the occasional casino as we went. I spent another ten dollars just for a laugh and ended up leaving town still five dollars ahead. Moby seemed to have a pretty healthy attitude towards gambling. He’d come with a set amount and was just there to have a good time. He had no delusions of winning it big or, the opposite, no hidden illness that would have him spending his rent money. Watching roulette he decided that he wanted to play a couple games. After spending ten dollars and a couple ups and downs he walked away ten dollars richer. Obviously he’d listened to the wise words of Mr. Kenny Rogers.
Kahloz, on the other hand, was a casino’s wet dream. He came into town with money burning a hole in his pocket. Since he is one of my recently unemployed brethren I was worried about him spending so much. When he left his job he got a nice severance package and some other stuff. At present he isn’t hurting for money. But with this economy it’s best to play things safe. I was worried that the hundred dollars he had in his pocket would quickly lead to trips to the ATM.
We all had our own systems for the slots. Mine was to play a machine for five turns, pocket any winnings, and then move on. Fairly conservative gambling. Moby would stay at a machine and try to figure out its payoff rhythm. If he got a sense that the machine was done then he would move on. Kind of the zen approach. Kahloz’s system was to stuff as much money into a machine as possible. It got to a point where he was shoveling quarters in faster than the machine could keep up. It wasn’t about the game anymore. It was more like a reflex. The tumblers spin, then they stop, put in more quarters, press the button. He wasn’t even stopping to see if he won or not. The outcome wasn’t important. Thinking about my unpaid credit card bills it was difficult to watch the way he was tossing his money away.
And then he won. Sixty dollars. Of course, it had taken him sixty dollars to win that. So, conservative me, it being the end of the day, I suggested he quit while he’s even. Nope. More quarters at an even faster pace. And then he won again. Another sixty dollars. It was at that point that he was finally willing to quit. Sort of. He spent another twenty dollars as we made our way down the boardwalk, back to Resorts, and out to the loading dock to catch the bus. Maybe if we’d stayed longer he would have blown the whole wad and been back down to nothing. So I guess six hours was the perfect amount of time.
On the way to the loading dock, walking down the pathway through rows of slot machines, I finally started to notice just how loud they were. The constant bling bling of large and small winnings and the tiny flashing lights in staccato on the periphery of my vision created a minor feeling of vertigo, even though I was firmly on the ground. The room tilted slightly like just after having been spun around. It was like I was passing through some kind of barrier, the casino a living thing that didn’t want me to go. Overall just a strange feeling to end my experience with.
The bus ride home was no picnic. First it was too hot and everyone complained (I thought old people liked everything warm). Then the air conditioning made it too cold and everyone complained again. When we reached Woodside, Queens there was supposed to be a bus waiting to take some of our passengers, our Middle Eastern chatterboxes included, to Main Street in Flushing, quite a distance away. But there was no bus waiting and an uproar ensued. The backseat driver, Walter got into a shouting match with one of the chatterboxes. I was just waking up as the debate raged over where the bus was going next, to follow its set route or to deliver the squawkers to Flushing. Moby and Kahloz were annoyed, so we got off the bus and walked to the nearest subway stop to get home.
The fight on the bus reminds me of Landsdowne Street in Boston just after two a.m. on a weekend night. The clubs all close and a sea of drunks spills out onto this one small strip of road. Some of these people have gotten lucky and will be taking someone home with them. The others aren’t so lucky, going home alone, denied their objective of the evening. These losers are drunk and agitated, unrequited hormones running through their systems. It’s inevitable that at least one fight breaks out over the rage of not getting what they wanted. When we were twenty-one it was about winning some sex. When we get to seventy-one will it be about winning the jackpot? What a strange difference fifty years makes.
From The Monkey House a/k/a Simon Take the money and run
The Random: I can’t believe that television news reporters have the audacity to act indignant when the police decide to use them to try and catch the sniper. Ten people are dead and three more injured. Anything that helps stop the jackass doing this is a good thing. To the fuckers in the news media, let’s try to keep some perspective.
