This is a typical exchange at the annual Tahoe trip I usually take with my friends:

- So, Greg, are you up or down?

- Down two dollars.

- Two dollars. Right.  And that was from--?

- Well, I blew a buck at the penny slots…

- And the other dollar?

- ...the Simpsons pinball machine.

The fact is, I don’t like to gamble.  It’s not a pleasurable experience. Part of the fact is that I always lose, which is likely because I believe I’m going to lose. I am not especially religious or superstitious, but I do believe that our attitudes and perceptions create the world in which we live. So if I think I’m going to lose at a card game, I will lose.  If I expect Adam Sandler to create bad movies, then he will.

Watching those slots spin into place is not a feeling of joy. It’s more like a tight, tense feeling of fear, such as when you wake up after a night of drunken excess and realize that the hooker named Laverne ran off with your wallet and car.  You know that feeling as well as I do, and it’s no bed of roses.  Plus, have you realized that slot machines are now computerized? At least when they used to run on rubber bands and pulleys, you could pretend that you had a fighting chance. These days, forget it.  The computers are only programmed to create jackpots for obnoxious, middle-aged New Jersey housewives named Lucille.

My idea of gambling is sitting at the beach:

Gambling that my friend James’s GoodReads.com recommendation Sacred Games is all that he says it is (so far it’s pretty good)--

Gambling that sunblock 15 is enough to shield my poor Irish skin (umbrella helps too)--

Gambling that two mojitos won’t spoil my appetite for dinner (who cares either way)--

I’m no Kenny Rogers but I consider these feats to be highly daredevil in their own individual ways.