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Wednesday Morning At 5 O' Clock I woke up kind of depressed, and starting to see a correlation between my moods and the amounts of money that I am managing to make.
3 days of shitty earnings in busking had whittled my cash supply down to 10 dollars; almost even.
I still had the 5 dollar casino chip, though.
The "3%" Jar-that-will-never-be-touched, hit about 25 dollars after I dropped the minimum deposit of 35 cents into it; effectively verifying that, in the past month or so, I have been unable to prosper upon 97% percent of everything I made.
11 Black
I decided to take the route up Canal Street, past Harrahs Casino.
The previous day, I had been told "Not today," by the security  guy at the front podium.
I hadn't argued, because I knew that he must have had carte blanche in rejecting anyone whom he thought was going to come in there and pick ashtrays and scoop up unfinished drinks but not gamble away anything in return.
I did walk over to another more important looking employee, within the sight of the security guy, who looked on with a smug smile as if to say "He's gonna tell you the same thing!"
After briefly complaining about being barred entry, I pulled my Starbucks card out of my wallet and showed it to her, saying: "I have a Starbucks card," and then held the $5 chip in my hand like a badge and said "And chips."
She was at a loss for what to say "I don't know..." but my hope was that the security guy would think that I was flashing some kind of credentials and that he may have just barred some kind of undercover agent from the Gaming Commission (or something) from the casino; and had screwed up ...Didn't you get the memo?!?
I do stuff like that.
My previous trip there, I had sat in Starbucks charging my phone but not buying anything. I HAD tried to bet the $5 chip on black, though, but there had been a 25 dollar minimum at that (weekend) time.
The Coincidences

My first forray into Harrahs, I was with Sue the Colombian lady. I had tried to play a number, but was bebuffed by the mimimum bet thing...
I was stopped by the dealer, and informed of the minimum.
It came up black 11.....gee, I would have won...
Today, I found the 5 dollar minimum table and was able to place the chip on black.
Coincidence #1: It came up black 11, again.
I then had 10 dollars and probably should have taken a 10 dollar chip to carry around with me for a couple of weeks like I did the 5 dollar one; until it started to feel lucky.
I instead bet the 10 dollar chip on red; and lost when it came up black 6. Maybe the guy meant put it on black, perpetually.
I left; having been wiped out. I felt like there were 100 eyes upon me as I made my way across the football field sized carpet toward the exit. They could see in my walk that I had just been wiped out. I struggled to keep my head somewhat up.
Coincidence #2:
I got here to the library and signed up for this computer with 35 minutes to wait for it.
I wandered over to the "new releases" book table and happened to pick up a book by  a self-help specialist, and flipped it open to a page with the heading of "Coincidences," and read a bit about them; still thinking about how much of a coincidence the Black 11 was.
Posted by Daniel McKenna at 4:40 PM