Chris: 4 Casino Niagara: 1

Casino Niagara finally got me. After four consecutive victories against The Man, I was finally knocked around at the blackjack tables. I ended up recouping all but twenty of the two hundred dollars I lost in the first few hours beside the Falls, so I’m still up over five hundred or so. However, even if I hadn’t gotten a lot back, the trip was fantastic for a number of reasons, but mainly because A) I found not one, but three people to hang at the tables with me and B) I got to play for about a dozen hours at a cost of merely twenty dollars.

My biggest peeve of the people who flow into and out of the tables is that people seem to be gambling with the sole purpose of making money. Obviously, that’s one of the extremely attractive aspects of the casinos, but you should enjoy what you’re doing as well. If you need to earn money, don’t come to a casino, get a job or sell something you have – unless it’s a Casablanca situation, where you need money to escape a Nazi-controlled country and don’t want your fiancé to have sex with the chief of police. Gamble because you enjoy it, and accept that just as likely as you being able to win hundreds of dollars is the chance the table goes cold and you lose absolutely everything. I had a blast because after a few suitors proved too unlucky or unskilled to be my wingman at the blackjack table, Pete blew me away with his winnings, Kody played with us for six hours straight on Saturday and Bobby took the idea of beginner’s luck to a whole new level. I can’t wait until we get an entire crew together and rock out entire tables, slinging one-liners and drinks with Garry, the greatest dealer of all-time.

That being said, we’re going to set a weekend late in summer, after we clear it with Livey’s race schedule and everyone’s wedding/reunion situation and get it set so that people can get off work and descend upon the Falls. It would be too good of a time for anyone to want to pass up.

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What would the effect be of dropping the drinking age in the States to 19? I can’t imagine it being the worst thing in the world, considering a lot of 19 and 20 year-olds are already drinking anyway, either with a fake ID, at a private residence or in a state where the bar laws are really lax. I don’t think it would be the worst thing in the world, although the potential for DUI’s to go up, but hey, your minor-in-possession citations would be guaranteed to go down…

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One of the big “What-if?” questions of this year for me will be the fact I passed up free tickets for the Pirate game Saturday night, due to the fact we’d still be on the way home from Niagara, and then saw it still on when I got to Pete’s house after midnight, firmly implanted in the 17^th inning. Granted, I’m not kicking myself nearly as much as I would be if there’d been a no-hitter or perfect game, but still, it be fun to brag about being at the 18-inning monster.

The fantastic Pirates blog Where Have You Gone, Andy Van Slyke? covers the multitude of high-points from last night, one of the few brightspots in this miserable, Burnitz-infested season.

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Second half of Mavs/Suns calls to me, but I hope everyone is having a great Memorial Day and fantastic summer thus far. The weather has finally turned to fit the time of year, and when more time becomes available, you’ll get an extended, better post. Sorry for the poor quality and brevity of this one.