Continued Confessions

for real today

A literal confession is in order for this morning. I was all excited to get two free donuts from Krispy Kreme as advertised in honor of the multiple election events dubbed as Super Tuesday. I had confirmed that the offer applied even in states without primaries so off I went. The nearest outlet to me is at the Mohegan Sun casino, and I used to go there every week to dance to live bands for old people dubbed as Forever Young. While the dancing was stopped during Covid and hasn’t returned unfortunately, the casino is definitely open and I occasionally go for a nostalgic visit. So I had $14.76 on a cashout voucher which can usually give me quite a few hands of online poker. Coupled with the free coffee I can get while gambling, I decided to go up there early on Tuesday for breakfast of coffee and donuts on the house, so to speak.

The first glitch occurred when the Krispy Kreme outlet said they weren’t participating, but I actually did get the donuts because I don’t think they wanted to mess with a hungry, angry, old witch who may not be totally computer literate. Armed with the free donuts, I went off in search of the coffee. Well, while the casino is open not all the services seem to be geared for early mornings. Usually, I can sit at one of the bars and order decaf coffee (which is delicious, by the way), as I sit operating my gambling machine. After talking to quite a few staff members it was determined that sitting near the entrance where the “cocktail” waitresses would emerge might get me a cup of coffee. So I sat right next to the swinging doors and inserted my $14.76. Each pull of the lever was 50 cents (double what I usually play on poker), so I was judicious about how many times I did it. With still no sign of any waitress or coffee, I hit something good that resulted in my cash voucher now being $15.26. At that exact moment my morning call from my lover arrived, so I took that as a sign to leave. I noted that I would stop at McDonald’s on the way home for the senior coffee which with tax comes to exactly one dollar. Meanwhile, I had eaten most of one of the donuts. Unfortunately, that much sugar on an empty stomach, combined with the fact that I had been in Afib since before I left the house, resulted in extreme dizziness and disorientation. As I stumbled around looking for the exit—you know they purposely make it difficult for us to leave these gambling emporiums—I was helped immensely by a wonderful young man originally from Haiti. His name was Jean and he escorted me to the escalator which would deliver me from Hell. Merci beaucoup, Jean!

Unfortunately, the drama continued as I made it to my car. I was able to drive down the road the short distance to the McDonald’s but by the time I got out of the car I almost collapsed again. Stumbling up to the counter (ignoring the latest screen ordering device which I hope I never have to get used to), I managed to stutter out that I needed meat. We agreed on a sausage egg McMuffin with no cheese because I don’t eat dairy, and it came with hash browns, and the small decaf. I had a $20 bill as backup and ended up getting the breakfast for $5 which included about a 75 cent tip I think. Anyway, I felt absolutely rotten but knew that the answer was to fill my stomach, and sure enough the meal topped off with the remaining donuts did the trick. Enough anyway, that I was able to drive the rest of the way home and collapse. Of course, I suffered the next day from the surfeit of salt and fat associated with fast food, but in this case it felt like a lifesaver. One more upside to this story, besides the lessons learned to never leave home on an empty stomach and particularly be careful of driving with Afib, is that I went through the bag that I use for casino visits and actually found another voucher in the amount of $7.65. The vouchers have a shelf life of 180 days so now I have to do the math from 9/17/2023. If that one is still good, my misadventure has been a final plus!