jennings rampage

Let’s recap.

I trace the start of the bad luck to sometime shortly after I leave the blackjack table last Thursday night in Atlantic City while still on a hot streak. Let my misfortune be a lesson for you all.

1. I spent the next four hours losing $130 playing $2-4 Texas Hold ‘Em, the Cadillac of poker. It would have been closer to a $200 loss had I not spiked the three of diamonds on fifth street, backing me into my dear friend, the wheel. (Poker lingo is AWESOME.)

2. After doing it up at the Sultan’s Feast and being extra-cautious on the Atlantic City Expressway, I get pulled at 1am on the dinky road in front of my office, having been paced doing 45 in a 30. I’m let off with a warning, and drive very slowly for the next three minutes to my hotel.

3. Having carefully packed all my hair gel and shaving cream into my brand-new black leather tolietries bag on Friday, I take great care in leaving it on the counter in the bathroom of my hotel room. Hair gel is easily replaced (yeah, like I’m going to walk around without a quart of Dep, for sure), but I also managed to leave my laptop’s power supply. These items are safe in Jersey, at least, and on their way back to me. Still, how very annoying to not have keys beneath my fingers in the evening, and I look very stupid having gone without my Mach 3 for a week.

4. Back to my current home census region without incident from the Philadelphia-Wilmington-Atlantic City, PA-NJ-DE-MD consolidated metropolitan statistical area, I promptly lock my keys in the Purpulator at that damned go-go bar. $47.95 to get them out.

5. On Saturday, I have the open road and the cruise control set for 81 in a 55. The Virginia state trooper in the unmarked burgundy Lincoln tags me, pulls me, and writes me a summons for reckless driving, 76 in a 55. I need to learn more about section 46.L of the Virginia code, since 2 miles per hour could have saved me, and definitely work on my contrition when questioned by a trooper. “It was Saturday afternoon and there was no one else on the road” was the WRONG ANSWER to “why were you going so fast?” I never thought I’d actually be hoping beyond hope for traffic school, and this slick law-talkin’ guy I hired had best make it happen.

6. And so, for a couple of days, nothing interesting happens, mainly because I’m not driving fast enough. But this morning, two of the girls from the maintenance staff knock at my door a minute before I’m ready to walk out of it, and they tell me that it appears that my car has been burglarized. So it would seem, what with the trunk popped and a door wide open and a great deal of stuff all over the parking lot. They ransacked the Purpulator pretty well, took my brother’s slick-as-shit stereo system, duh, and all of my CDs for some reason. Witnesses report seeing two white males sorting through a red car at around 3am this morning, and did nothing because they assumed it was theirs. They ended up hitting eight or nine cars on my block, and apparently they really really like Jethro Tull. So the Purpulator’s at the shop getting her dashboard put back together, and I’m driving a rented white Galant to get around. The Whitulator? No fuckin’ way.

The go-go dancer said she’d call tonight, but given #1-6, I’d put money on me watching the World Poker Tour on the Travel Channel in my underwear while I find a way to start a fire with a George Foreman Grill. I’ll keep you posted.