Rose and Doc planned a last minute trip to this little casino oasis in Northwest Louisiana. Many casinos have 100 times odds. The trip started out as an opportunity to get back in touch with a man and his wife we had not seen in years. They now live in East Texas. I served in the army with him and had not had contact for some 30 odd years. We were in ROTC at the University of Texas, then officers basic course in Ft. Lee, Virginia and followed by a "cruise" on an army boat for about 10 days as we crossed the Atlantic to be stationed in Germany. A real arm pit of a boat. After that our paths went in different directions. This was a long time ago. Can’t begin to tell you how much Doc and Rose enjoyed making contact. We plan to see them in the future.

As if that wasn’t enough fun, we were able to attend several of our niece’s volleyball games in a tournament in–where else–but Louisiana. Luckily we were able to get rooms at the last minute so stayed a couple of days.

Now to the final fun and entertaining part of this last minute trip. We did arrive on a Sat afternoon but were tired from two days of family and friends so we played little if any. Would not start our rolling until Sunday morning.

As we write this Doc cannot find the little note book where the rolls were kept, so this will be from memory.

As we started out that morning nothing much was happening for a couple of turns. Table moderately crowded. Rose started out with a roll of about 5 and Doc followed up with a very respectable–drum roll please–point, seven out. The dice came around and Rose rose to the occasion with a very profitable 35. Now it was Doc’s turn and he doubled his prior roll to a 4. Back to Rose who had an 8 and Doc caught on fire with a 25. Rose a 13 where we broke even. Doc a short roll. Then Rose rolled 28 followed by Doc with a 22. We each took one more turn and lost a little back and called it quits.

We changed casinos to where her brother, his wife and their son were staying. The tables are terrible so we did not play craps. Played a little 2 deck BJ and won a few $$$ but not much. Went to another BJ table to observe our nephew play and a really drunk guy had a boat load of pumpkins in front of him betting $1000 to $3000 per hand and winning them betting crazy. Supposedly he had cashed $30,000 at another casino the day before and cashed in for $50,000 this time. People were commenting how much he had won and Doc said if he bought in for $100,000 he was a loser. The way he plays I would guess he is a long term loser.

Tommy C, Son of Tommy C and Daughter in Law of Tommy C showed up as we had called them the day before. Not much happening. We had some short rolls where we lost a little, some rolls in the mid to high teens which brought us back and Daughter in Law of Tommy C had a very nice 27. The Tommy C family had to head back to the old day time job. Great to see them and look forward as they may well be in Memphis and Vegas for those class weekends.

The next day Doc was at SL1 (Rose at SR1) when we went up to the table. To say we did not have much success or any at all would be an understatement. After Doc had his short roll with a 7 out, a young man at SL2 got the dice and Doc noticed he was setting the hard way set and using a throw similar to what we teach in GTC. Doc even went to the end of the table at SL1 to watch his throw. It was obvious that he had read a book–probably a GTC book. After his turn was over–I had him back away from the table and asked if he had read a book. He said yes the one with the Dominator. Later we had a long talk–away from the craps table–and we talked about our class and what we teach. He had watched the video that came with the book so he was probably "hooked" on what GTC is about. Later we had a very pleasant dinner in the steak house. Have been in contact since we returned home and hope he will be in a class soon. He should make an excellent student.

Now the rest of our gambling story. For about the fourth time we had not been having success at the craps table and went to play some double deck BJ. As luck would have it we won back what little we had lost at the craps table plus a few pictures of Benny to boot.

After dinner at the steak house we we went back to the casino the last night. The BJ tables were crowded as were the craps table. After a short time Rose got her position at SR1 with no room at the table for Doc. Doc walked around for a short time and saw an opening at SL1 at another table and went there. It was across the pit form Rose’s table. She was rolling and rolling and rolling. In the mean time Doc finally got the dice and rolled a 39. He colored up and left as Rose was doing the same at her table. She had a 27. Sweet. Just sorry we could not be at the same table together as that would have been even more fun. We were both able to watch each other across the pit–so still fun.

We played a little the next morning and lost a couple of Bennies back packed up and left with one of our best wins ever. We were not able to get to our positions at the craps tables this time.

We always look back as to what we learned from the trip.

1. Sometimes things simply don’t go good–no matter how good the dice look the old 7 keeps popping up and we had too many short rolls. BUT you must trust your throw. As we say in GTC, we are .300 hitters—you will have your bad turns with the dice, bad sessions, bad days and on occasion bad trips. As we think over this past trip we had excellent results about 30% of the time and the other 70% when we were using the 5 count and GTC betting principles we lost little and on occasion made a few dollars on these short rolls. Several of our wins were made in short small amounts, but small wins add up. When the big roll comes it is great, but don’t forget you can do well on many short rolls. Shorter rolls are where you can protect you bank roll and this will keep you in the game when the big roll does come. As No Field Five says "trust your throw."

2. Be patient and don’t be greedy. Bet within the limits of your bankroll. If you have a short roll and the table is crowded it may take an hour or more before the dice get back to you. If we have been there a while we might color up and leave the table after our respective turns with the dice, or at the very least take a break–leave our chips on the table and come back after a "bathroom" break or a "check email on the phone" break.

3. Keep a tab on how you do on random rollers. By all means use the five count and make a minimum bet–we use one come bet with low odds (usually 2 x odds). Probably 5 or 6 times after the five count on the next roll the random roller threw a 7 and we won $5 or $10 on him. At least twice after winning two come bets with odds, the chicken feeder–when I put my 3rd come bet up–rolled a seven. Two wins, a win on the 7 out and no money on the table is always a real winner. When chicken feeders are rolling I keep chips that I win in a separate area of the chip rail to keep track of wins (or losses) for the session. One time Doc got lucky and won $85 on a chicken feeder. Did I win on these Cf’ers for the trip, probably not but lost very little.

4. When you play craps you will get tired so take a break. We often go to the room to take a break where we read or even take a nap. Play when refreshed.

We have rambled enough so will close for now. We had a great trip and our 401G is now a little bigger. Hope to see everyone in Memphis this month and/or Vegas in June.

Rose and Doc

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