Vegas...and Newly Acquired Gambling Skills

Since I'm a little behind with everything that happened over the Holiday break, I've missed writing about a few important things. Namely, that I have now mastered Blackjack. 
Golf, Surfing, Graphs - is there anything I can't do? Technically have not done surfing yet but I can't see that being difficult at all so just calling it "nailed" now.

Played a lot of skittle blackjack while I was in Vegas, prepping myself to go out and hit the high roller tables. By the end of the week, it was time so I swaggered on over to the $5 table - go big or go home...

Playing for Skittles is harder than money but more delicious.  And for the record, the dealer will smack your hand hard if you try and eat his Skittles.  He will also penalize you by taking Skittles away if you're seen to not be paying attention or color-sorting your Skittles.  I learned gambling in the school of hard knocks, the real world is a lot easier.

Got dealt my first card. Got my hand smacked for picking it up without waiting for the second one. Looked at my cards. Turned 'em over. Got yelled at for turning them over. Asked for a hit with a subtle hand movement. Got schooled on the correct hand movement (pretty keen on making my own special hand movement at this point). At this stage, the dealer had made me nervous and my usual lightning quick mathematical calculations weren't working as well as normal. 
So my first few hands were a bit suspect. In general, if you have just 4, you should probably ask for another card. Also, if you have asked for another card when you had 20, you might be considered an idiot.

Made myself a friend who gave me a few tips.  I gave him a tip in return to just to be friendly.  "Get some teeth.  Yours are all missing."

Finally got into the swing of things - turns out different tables have different hand signals and ways of doing things but the dealer's will let you know pretty quickly. And they don't always use their words.  I apparently misinterpreted the look that I thought meant I was a beautiful, smart and canny blackjack player...

After a while, I'd broken even and decided it was time to move forward with my plan to make a billion before leaving to catch my flight in an hour.  At a $5 table, betting $5 at a time, I calculated the number of minutes remaining and odds of me winning all the hands and it came out to a sure thing which is how gambling works..    

Names I would Name the Children I Don't Have

I'm bound to offend someone with this. I thought about apologizing. And then I thought, no.

1. Twins - Beryl and Trevor
2. Albert Nigel. Because this is already proven to be a great name. Then I would have Albert Nigel the cat and Albert Nigel the imaginary child. Who could be boy or girl since I think the names are gender neutral. Albert is a lovely girls name. Bert for short.
3. Doctor. This will make my imaginary kid sound super smart. First day of school - "Doctor Finlayson?" "Here." Those other kids won't stand a chance.
4. Shifty Dodger (could either be hyphenated or a first and second name)
5. Dodgy Shifter (same as above)
6. Vegas - this will be the one time where what happened in Vegas is pretty frickin' obvious.
7. Cinderella - what little girl doesn't want to be named after a princess?  Only see this as an issue if it's a boy...
8. Cheese.  Cos I love cheese.  I also love peanut butter but that would be mean and my imaginary kid would probably get teased a lot.  By its imaginary friends.
9. I think I will have 9 imaginary children (surprisingly, it's not as hard as the real thing.  Apparently).  2-8 will just be chronological order e.g. 2nd, 3rd etc.  
10. 4Real.  Banned in New Zealand but I live in America!  Apparently the story behind this is that when the father found out that they were expecting, he cried out "4real!" in complete surprise.  Not "for real" like you might expect.  And there was no zed added on as in "4realz".  Which is a shame.  Other banned names included Anal, Christ, Messiah , Mr, *, Majesti (nice creative spelling there) and Juztice (also showing good use of the "Z").  

We're a fairly unique country but not alone - Sweden also banned Superman and Brfxxccxxmnpcccclllmmnprxvclmnckssqlbb11116.  Which looks like what Albert typed in an email to his grandmother last night. When he lay down on the keyboard to do it...

Things I Might Do For A Year...But Probably Not...

I was talking to my trainer yesterday and he mentioned that the way to make money is to do something for a year and write a book about it. So, I am going to do something for a year, write a book about it, you will all buy it (and the rest of the world), I will make a lot of money and then do nothing for many years. Just have to figure out what to do, have come up with the following options so feel free to weigh in on them. Whatever gets the most feedback, is the winner and I’ll start my year of whatever it is. Soon. Ish*.

1. Get married for a year**
2. Have a baby for a year***
3. Not eat cake for a year****
4. Live on a farm for a year. Let’s be clear, I’m just going to live there, I’m not going to brand cows, milk cows, fix fences, dock sheep, shear sheep or do anything with anything that smells bad. And someone is going to need to pay me.
5. Share my house with a stranger for a year. Who will pay me. And think themselves lucky. Pretty sure I am a joy to live with. Just not in the mornings, parts of the evening and during the day. 11:00am is good for about 20 minutes. On a good day.
6. No shopping for dresses, shoes or handbags for a year*****
7. Not breathing for a year. Think this has some flaws. Probably math involved.
8. Live underwater for a year. To see if I am a Mermaid. Unless someone wants to build me an underwater house. You’ll need a lot of caulk.
9. Travel for a year. Someone pick this. And pay for this. I’ll be your best friend******.
10. Drink excessively every day for a year

Thankfully I don’t have to pick exercise every day for a year or eat healthy every day for a year since some other people have that covered.

This is quite hard to think of things, there’s a lot of stuff I think I’m supposed to be doing already that popped into my head. Shower every day for a year, be nice to old people every day for a year, have a stupid positive attitude every day for a year, utilize my time effectively every day for a year etc…

*I may or may not do this. Am very fickle. Also I have to write a book at the end so seems like a lot of effort already…
**I’m going to need some volunteers on this one. Meet me in Vegas
***Logistically speaking, I don’t know how this is going to work. Pretty sure I can’t be pregnant for a year. So do I have someone give me their baby for the year to look after or do I get knocked up and then write after I’ve had the baby out of me for a year. Already this is more complicated than I had anticipated. Is everyone cool with Albert babysitting the baby while I’m at work?
****Any of your bastards pick this and you will not be getting a Xmas card this year.
*****See note on cake. I don’t have a problem. I need that stuff. To survive.
******For those that I am already being their best friends for other favors, sorry, going to have to drop you…