MR WRONG: The house loses
Indignity Vol. 4, No. 214
MR WRONG: My Local Casino Is Busted
COLUMN DEP’T.
MINDFUL READERS OF the Mr. Wrong column are aware that most of the Mr. Wrong columns are typed in Baltimore, Maryland, USA, and today the Royal We are gonna get hyper-local and address a topic that might not be of interest to the General Public outside of the Baltimore area, so I thank you for your kind attention, and if you don’t want to hear about the Horseshoe Casino in Baltimore, then you are of course free to scroll down for the Weather Review and stuff, thank you again for reading this many words of the Mr. Wrong column!
OK, so the other day I was looking at the Baltimore Banner, which is a new-ish website that is like a daily newspaper, except they don’t print a paper, but otherwise it is doing a good job of being another source of News in Baltimore, which is good, because the Baltimore Sun, the big printed-on-paper newspaper got bought by a guy who owns a buncha TV stations and seems like kind of a fuckin’ jerk, who said he didn’t read the paper he bought, and it seems like he’s generally tryna just use the newspaper to further his own agenda, which is fine, this is America, you wanna buy a newspaper and louse it up, it’s your dough, and dude probably will figure out a way to suck a buncha money out of the deal and unemploy a bunch of hardworking newspaper people, again, this is America, Inc., etc.
Anyway! In the Baltimore Banner, I read this article about how the Horseshoe Casino here in town is not doing so hot.
Giacomo Bologna,Hallie Miller
I dunno exactly how Baltimore “took a big bet,” by building a Casino on the former site of a chemical factory near a facility where they still incinerate garbage, but anyway, somebody’s gotta write a headline to get people interested, to read the article, which is good, very informative, some interesting history of how there used to be slot machines in southern Maryland and stuff, and how the Horseshoe is only raking a million bucks a month in profit, which is way less than what it was supposed to be doing, and there’s reasons, according to the article, but if you have been to the Casino any time recently, it’s pretty simple, the place is a fucking toilet.
Seriously, park your car in the grim, scary, free parking building connected to the Casino, and the first thing that hits you when you climb outta your car is the smell of stank urine, feh! There are people camping in their cars, there’s trash, it’s disgusting. It’s the first experience you have after you park your car following a dimly lit, semi-confusing drive up a buncha ramps to where the genpop can park. It’s depressing! It smells like piss! What the fuck!
On that note, let me demonstrate that I have a certain amount of standing to crap on the Casino. Nobody wanted the Casino to be a success more than me! When it opened, I went for a whole day.
I have eaten at the steakhouse inside the Casino a coupla times, once when it was Binions and once when it was Gordon Ramsay, and I had the fuckin’ Wellington and it was aces. I still go every once in a while to use the Off Track Betting, but the experience gets more and more less-than. There used to be a cool circular bar near the Parimutuel Wagering counters, where you could get a drink. There was also a bar right near the “windows” that had live feeds from the parks we could bet on, off-track. Every time I go now, the circular bar is inactive, and they got rid of the bar right next to the betting. Now if I wanna sit and have a beer and study my Racing Form, I gotta walk all the way back to near the entrance, near the Sports Book, which I don’t give a shit about, but you gotta have one if you are a Casino.
Seriously, they didn’t used to have one, a Sports Book, I even got quoted about it, in a serious Wagering Industry publication.
OK, so I am lazy and I wanna drink a beer in front of my Racing Form and not have to walk a tenth of a mile or whatever to get a bet down on the ponies, fine, I am in the minority of Wagering at the Casino, I guess.
Table Games are more popular, stuff like Blackjack and Roulette and Craps, fine, except there’s no way I would even think about going to the Blackjack table because the minimums are not very! I mean, there are places where you can bet five dollars on a hand of Blackjack, but it’s very hard to find anything lower than $15 at the Horseshoe Casino in Baltimore, and I am sure there are all kinds Business reasons for this, but they are ignoring an important aspect of the Casino experience, which is: FUN!
The Horseshoe Casino is depressing, full of desperate people trying to score. That is a normal layer of the Casino industry! You also need the folks, like me, who want to go to a Casino and have FUN! I wanna lay down five dollars on a hand of Blackjack, not $25, that’s too much, that hurts! It’s not FUN!
You can go to a Casino in Vegas and have a blast and never make a bet or drop cash into a slot machine. There’s music, there’s drinks, there’s artwork and oddities and stuff to look at. There’s the energy of FUN.
When the Horseshoe opened, at night they would have live music inside, in a cool setup above the large central bar. They would also have music outside, during the day, and have cheap beer and stuff. It was FUN to hang out and have a few beers, and then maybe go inside and make a few bets! They are ignoring this segment of the community who might go to the Casino, which is, I think, important, as far as building a sense of Public goodwill toward what could seem like a very scary place, a den of iniquity, even.
I wanted to have the Casino as a spot to hit on my way to or from the nearby baseball stadium, or now, the wacky Top Golf thing, there are forces at work trying to make the area FUN, but there’s a fuckin’ tower burning garbage and a bummer downer of a no-fun Casino!
Horseshoe Casino shot-callers, take a look at the OTB in Timonium, at the fairgrounds. They have a nice bar and restaurant right next to the betting parlor, it’s a pleasant experience, FUN, even!
The last time I was at the Casino they had figured out a way to allow smoking, arguably outside of the Casino, but really, just in a room separated from the main floor by some doors, and the inside of the room is technically a balcony, with open air, so it’s like a “smoking deck” or whatever, where you could get a drink and play some gambling machines. I could see myself going in there for a drink and maybe to torch a cigar, but it’s surrounded by no FUN.
I wish the kind of innovative thinking that went into creating that smoker’s section could go into making the Casino a place that is more FUN. I don’t care if the company that owns the Horseshoe is $12 billion in debt! Make it work in Baltimore, make it FUN!
The MR. WRONG COLUMN is a general-interest column appearing weekly. No refunds. Write Wrong: wrongcolumn@gmail.com.
WEATHER REVIEWS
New York City, December 4, 2024
★★ This time, on the way out to the garbage cans, the sun was no match for the cold. The tailpipe of the IROC-Z made the air steam with the heat of its idling, awaiting the street sweeper. Before long even the look of a fine day was gone, as the wind blew in a sheet of clouds and with them a withered December light. People were bundled up in full standard deep-winter gear. Gusts roared outside in the night, before 6 p.m.
EASY LISTENING DEP'T.
HERE IS TODAY'S Indignity Morning Podcast.
Tom Scocca
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TOM SCOCCA
ADVICE DEP'T.
GOT SOMETHING YOU need to justify to yourself, or to the world at large? Other columnists are here to judge you, but The Sophist is here to tell you why you’re right. Direct your questions to The Sophist, at indignity@indignity.net, and get the answers you want.
SANDWICH RECIPES DEP'T.
WE PRESENT INSTRUCTIONS in aid of the assembly of a sandwich selected from Fruit Recipes: A Manual of the Food Values of Fruits and Nine Hundred Different Ways of Using Them, by Riley M. Fletcher Berry, published in 1919 and available at archive.org for the delectation of all.
APPLE SANDWICHES
Spread thin bread with Apple Cheese (see recipe) or chopped uncooked apple mixed with nuts.
APPLE CHEESE (Cake or Tart Filling)
To a pound of sugar add one-fourth pint of water and one half pound of apples—peeled, cored, and quartered—and the grated rind of one lemon. Cook for three hours then add the juice of the lemon, boil for ten minutes, stirring continually, then removing. Use this as a filling for tarts or cake or with nuts as sandwich filling.
If you decide to prepare and attempt to enjoy a sandwich inspired by this offering, be sure to send a picture to indignity@indignity.net.
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