mary chapin carpenter sings "i feel lucky." that could have easily been my theme song for yesterday. at approximately 6:15 pm last night, right before my dad and i were about to pack it in after a day at the casino, i hit a progressive jackpot of $3,428.96 on a nickel slot machine (of all things!!)

i never really played slot machines before, opting always for the video poker machines which supposedly have the best odds for winning. but at the empire state casino i would say 80% of the machines are slot type games with themes varying from leprechauns to cows and milk money. some of them really are hilarious and they definitely pull you in.

i read once that if you are going to play slots, you should play the ones with a progressive jackpot that hooks several machines for one large jackpot. the particular machines we were playing had been relatively good to us the last time we were here. to us "relatively good" means you either break even or play a long time before you lose your initial deposit. now some of the slot machines have so many "winning" combinations it's impossible to know what you have to get to win until the machine tells you what you have won after each turn. these slots are easy, 3 columns and 3 rows. there are a few other bells and whistles to keep it interesting, but you can always tell if you win anything immediately. to win the progressive jackpot you have to get 3 gold coins. they don't even have to be in the same row to win, a fact i didn't even realize until after i had won.

anyway, after about 20 minutes my dad wasn't doing so well on his machine. but i was winning fairly consistently and i just wasn't ready to leave yet. call it a hunch but i had this feeling i was going to hit the jackpot on this machine. so my dad moved down a seat to another machine and i continued to play on the same machine. now even though it is only a nickel slot machine in order to win the jackpot you have to play 25 nickels at a time. if you play a progressive jackpot machine with that caveat (which all of them have) then it's not worth playing unless you bet the maximum. In this case it was really $1.25 each turn. i was winning enough to keep me in the game. plus i kept getting 2 gold coins (previously i had never gotten more than 1 gold coin per turn.)

and then all of a sudden there they were, 3 gold coins. i barely had time to see them because the screen lit up immediately with the words "congratulations you have won the progressive jackpot." i was floored. other people around me realized before i did! next thing you know i had a security guard and floor attendant at my side congratulating me and talking into walkie talkies. meanwhile, my dad who can't hear or see that well is not understanding what happened. between the noise of the casino and the questions being asked of me, i try to tell him how much i won. it's just not sinking in! it wasn't until i got back from the cashier that he realized it was a lot of money. he was happy for me and kissed me. i couldn't wait to get to the car and call ralph! i told him now i don't need a job this month!

so it was finally a lucrative day at the casino. it puts me way ahead of the game now and i will be able to afford to take my dad to the casino every other week for a while longer...

in between the losing and the winning of the day, i got in my 10,000 steps and ate on target. so all around it was a very good day for me!

i am uploading a couple of photos from the wedding; one of my niece and her new husband Ed, one of me and ralph and another of ralph and i with my sister and her family outside the church.

i hope everyone is feeling lucky today!