Local gambler claims he has a "system"

SAN JOSE (28 Aug): For the past few days, I have been afflicted with the gambler's syndrome. A syndrome where the wannabe gambler usually utters the phrase "I have a system" on the lines of Martin Luther King's "I have a dream". In my case, the phrase is "I have a dream to have a system".

In a recent trip to Las Vegas, presumably for a conference, I met up with an old friend, whom I had not met for years. Since he is a surgeon by profession, he thinks it is perfectly fine to apply his scalpel handling abilities to gambling. Little did I know that his scalpel would cut my wallet in half.

Armed with the knowledge of probabilities from the 10th grade, he persuaded me to try out a "system" that he had invented. After the 2nd beer, I agreed to listen to him. After 4th, I agreed that it is a fine system, and after 6th I agreed to try it myself.

With 200 dollars worth of chips in hand, we set out to the roulette table. I was singing songs of separation to the chips because I knew that I won't see them ever again. It was therefore pretty surprising that we won 50 bucks. Promptly disposing the sinful money to do some other sins that Vegas is famous for (no, not that), we decided to try the system again, this time at 5 in the morning. Lo and behold! another 40 bucks. By this time we had so many chips that I was forced to eat some of them with ketchup.

Ever suspicious, I went to my room and did a computer simulation of the system, which we had come to call our system. I was flabbergasted to see that the machine supported the surgeon.

Our greed grew, and so did our idiocy. We changed casinos the next day, and started another round. I promptly lost 60 bucks. Hmmm...interesting. Eager to recover the money, we went to our lucky table in our lucky casino. Lost bigtime. 200 bucks.

Since then, my catchphrase has become "I have a dream to take the scalpel and run it on my friend". Since then I have also found a flaw in my simulation.

Since then, I have also devised a new "improved" system. Next time, Vegas. I will get you next time.

Update from Suryanagar

SOUTH BAY AREA (3 Aug): Incase you are still wondering, Suryanagar is the slang for "Sunnyvale" aka the Indian ghetto in the Silicon Valley.

In local news, many charity runners in the San Francisco Marathon today failed at finding a cure for AIDS (see a funny Onion story here). Yours truly ran the half marathon, despite being completely out of shape and finished in a respectable 2 hrs 5 mins. The best part of the race was obviously the 4 miles going over and back on the super-awesome Golden Gate bridge. The race route was pretty scenic, along the Embarcadero road (which runs along the seafront), then the Golden Gate bridge over the ocean and some San Francisco residential neighborhoods. The notoriously steep San Francisco inclines were peppered throughout the course and they made sure that I never became complacent. But enough about the race.

My internship is wrapping up and I expect to be back in the filthy and disgusting city of Bombay in a month (I don't know how you Indians live there) ;-) And if I survive the ass-whooping I expect to get on this remark, I will resume my PhD, which has been under a moratorium for the past few months.