Gambling

Ya, I live in Utah.  It’s a great state to live in if you enjoy outdoor activities.  The liquor laws kinda suck, but you CAN get a drink here. It’s not as bad as it sounds. However, there is no gambling.  Any form of it is illegal. The mormons here have really done what they can to put the kibosh on all of it. So, we do what we can here on our own to get our little fix of it.  I do anyways.

I’ve been doing office pools for nearly 10 years now, and getting people of ‘the faith’ to participate is always a goal of mine. And most of the time it works, however, it’s not easy.

For the Super Bowl one year, I wanted to put together a $5 board.  This consisted of 100 squares that I needed to sell for $5 each.  Some people would buy 2 or even 4 squares.  Selling more than half the board was not very difficult.  But the other half was always a different story.  So this particular year, I changed the cost of the squares from $5 down to only $1.  A freakin buck!  Shouldn’t be that hard should it.  No!  But it was…

I was down to only a couple more squares to sell and had to get it done by the end of the day because the game was that weekend. I hit up Lincoln to buy a square and he says he can’t.  It’s against his religion.  I can respect that.  At least for a few minutes.  I move on asking the next person, then the next, then the next….c’mon people!  What’s the big deal?  It’s ONLY a buck!  Shit!  So as the day is nearing its end, I’m making a final round around the office to catch anyone I may have missed.  I see 3 engineers standing around talking amongst themselves.  One of which is Lincoln.  Lincoln, mind you, is one of the kindest people I’ve ever met.  He’d give you anything you needed if he had it.  So, I use this to my advantage…I butt in….

            ‘Anyone have a buck?’ I ask.

           

            ‘Ya, sure. I do!’ Lincoln says, as the others stopped reaching for the wallets. My plan is already working.  That was WAY to easy.

 

            Lincoln hands the buck over and I whip out my paper and pen and turn around and walk away saying, ‘Thanks.  I’ll put you down for one square and that fills the board up!’

 

            ‘No no no no no no.’ He says, chasing after me.

 

            ‘Sorry, too late.  You’re in!  And if you don’t want your winnings, I’ll take em!’

 

            ‘Ok’ he says, ‘Keep me in, but don’t put my name on the board.  Put something else.  I don’t want people to think I’m a “gambler”’.  ‘Dude’ I say, ‘I won’t tell your bishop if you don’t.’

           

Ya, I know I’m bad.  He didn’t end up winning anything either.  Sucks to be him!  Hahaha

 

Here’s one that got lucky!

James was one of those mormons that WANTED to be in on the gambling, but wouldn’t because he would get in trouble from his wife.  He actually used the excuse on me…’I never win with these things anyway.’ 

 

I asked, ‘Really?  How many times have you played?’

 

 ‘None.’  He reluctantly said. 

 

‘James…buddy…pal.  How would you expect to win if you don’t ever play?…c’mon.  I mean really.  It’s only 5 bucks.’

 

‘Na, I really shouldn’t.  It’s a waste of my money.  I won’t win.’

 

At this point, with only a couple of squares left to sell and James in front of me, wanting to play, but just too chicken shit to say it. My will to ‘convert’ him to gambling on my board was overwhelming. I had to turn to drastic measures... 

 

            ‘I’ll tell you what James.  I’ve never done this before, but I will just for you.  I’ll personally guarantee that you win.  If you don’t win anything, I’ll refund your 5 bucks back to you.  Right there you’ve already won.  You get to play without the risk of loosing your money.  And if you win, you keep all of it.’

Still, he was reluctant to play, but finally, after much coaxing from some other people, he finally gave in and played.

After the game was over, and I was checking the winners, I found that James had won!  He won the final score prize.  This was like $300!  Un-freakin-believeable!  Monday, he came to me, first thing, wanting to know if he read the board correctly, because he thought he had won.  And sure enough, he did.  D and I told him that since he won, he needed to bring in dounts and muffins for everyone in the office.   He was cool enough to oblige. 

And you know…being this ‘bookie’ that I am, I’ve learned that I have to make sure my numbers are right BEFORE I pay the cash out to the winners. 

Case and point:

I had added up the scores and got the winners for the World Series one year.  Sent out the email to the winners with all the scores so they could add up the scores themselves and see that I wasn’t screwing anyone over and that I was on the up and up.  Cuz these mormons here really need to watch every penny they get, because they’re already giving 10% of their income to their church and don’t want anymore of it slipping away.  But don’t get me started on that one….

I took the cash in hand and walked over to Rob, who won only $5.  Then over to a few others that won a little here and there, then up to Jeff who won $250.  I congratulated him on the big win (that he didn’t even know about) then went back to my desk.  A few min. later, one of the guys in the office said I had my numbers wrong. 

 

            ‘What?’ I said

 

            ‘Ya, you got your numbers wrong.  It was 5 to 3 in the 3^rd game, not 5 to 4.’

 

            ‘You sure?’

 

‘Well yeah.’ He said.

 

‘I’ll double check.’

 

Sure enough, he was right.  This changed EVERYTHING!  I had to go back and recalculate all the numbers then check all the winners again.  After all was said and done, Jeff, the guy that one the big prize, didn’t win a thing, and Rob, the guy that one the smallest amount, won the biggest amount. Go figure.

I couldn’t get out of my seat fast enough to get over to Jeff’s desk before he took off with the cash, but at the same time, I didn’t want to break the news to him that he had lost.  That’s got to be the worst ever.  To have a bunch of cash put in your hands saying that it’s yours, then to only have it stripped away 15 minutes later because sum knuckle head bookie can’t get it right!  Thank God he was a good sport about it and I didn’t have any problems getting it back from him. 

 Needles to say, Rob was pretty stoked about the whole mishap. He bought us breakfast the next morning and all was good.

 I haven’t done a whole lot of boards since then.  I’ve changed jobs a couple times and need to build up the clients again.  So, in the mean time, I’ll just golf.  And have been lately.  In fact, I’ve joined the golf league at work and have played a few games.  Got some stories there I could publish here as well.  Stay tuned!