Lake of Fire

We paid a visit to a casino today on our way back to Oklahoma City.

Rebecca thought the outside looked like Disneyland. Never someone to like Disneyland, I had to agree. The inside was even worse though; grim faces in lines to exchange coupons for money, zombie-looking human creatures dramatically pushing buttons, the unending ascending bubbly sounds of video games. "This is what happens when people volunteer to go to concentration camps," I whispered as we searched for an a.t.m.

With a slight sense of the possible deluded with some bullshit called "beginner's luck", we searched out a lucky machine. The first slots we found all looked like video games with grotesque characters rolling to line up as mermaids and mummies and Greek Gods and clovers and charms and crap. Somehow watching people play slot machines is even more boring than watching people play video games -- even with the possibility they can get their money back. Their faces were so blank that it was frightening. No laughter. No whooping up. No talking. No smiling. No nothing. Unless you count the returns as nothing.

The fucking place was crowded too. It gradually reminded me more of a Wal Mart than a concentration camp. Either way, it was a miserable, claustrophobic experience. The people all looked doomed. Manic depressive and angry.

As we fled, fifteen whole minutes after arriving, I couldn't resist saying SO LONG SUCKERS.

Some dumpy car pulling ahead of us towards the highway drove past with a barely inflated doughnut in place of a tire. For chrissakes, go blow baby's milk money on some fucking car maintenance instead of this dream that won't come true.