Kevin Standlee: Fandom Is My Way of Life

Lisa and I went into Reno for grocery shopping today, after which we went to John Ascuaga's Nugget in Sparks for the monthly Lightning Loot drawing, for which I'd earned 7 entries this month. This consists of five $1,000 drawings at 7 PM and a $10,000 drawing at 9 PM. Any unclaimed $1k prizes in the 7 PM draw (you have two minutes to show up after your name is called) are redrawn at 9 PM, and in the 9 PM draw they keep redrawing until someone shows up. For the first time ever, none of the $1k winners showed up at 7 PM, so the 9 PM draw was extra big.

After the draw, Lisa and I went to the Oyster Bar. Because it appears that Lisa is developing a dairy allergy of some sort, she can't have the shrimp pan roast. We were standing outside the Oyster Bar looking at the menu and trying to figure out if there was anything she could eat. To our surprise, William, our "regular" bread server, came out and greeted us and asked if we'd be having dinner tonight. We explained the issue with Lisa needing to avoid dairy products while we explore what's been making her sick, and he assured us that the restaurant would do everything it could to accommodate her. We went in and both tried new things. Neither was actually bad, but we will probably not have them again. Next time, Lisa is apt to try some of their non-stewed seafood, and I'll probably go back to the pan roast. But we continued to be flattered by the attention of William, who says we're among his favorite regular customers.

As dinner was ending, we flagged down one of the restaurant managers and told her how nice William has been, tonight and many times in the past. She told us that he'd just been named Employee of the Month, and we're not surprised. For the next month, his picture will periodically flash down from the big screen that fronts onto I-80. We also learned that he's being promoted to their steak house, which is actually the only restaurant there that we've never tried. Guess we'll have to give it a go sometime.

In the 9 PM drawing, all five names drawn for $1k showed up, after which it was time for the Big Bucks. They ended up having to draw four times before they hit a name of someone who was present and won the money. I came closer than ever this time, but won nothing. I saw my name flash by three different times during the evening, and for one of the $1k draws, they missed me by only five names (out of a couple of thousand in the draw). Oh, well, we had a good meal anyway, and Lisa came out money ahead on slot machines, so it was a pretty good night.