I learned my lesson when I was 20 years old in the military. I walked into a carnival type thing in the country near the base and right inside the gate was a wheel of fortune sort of wheel. We were given a free 1 dollar token. My buddy lost his on the spin. The next spin I won and doubled my dollar. I must have had 'gullible" written on my forehead.
To make a long story short, the next spin I would have to put in double my last bet and the carni would match it each time, $4 the next spin and the next $8 and so on if it wouldn't hit on 4 guaranteed to win tabs. The pot was growing quickly. The carni would match it and we would let it ride until I won the pot or left the game. At each spin if I lost, the tab was marked and if it hit one one of those again it wouldn't count and I would get another spin. There were about 30 tabs with 4 winning tabs. Once a tab was played it wouldn't count again. Each spin the pot would grow, but the used tabs would increase so the chances of winning would be higher.
I started getting sucked in and had my $100 or so in and the carni was gracious to let me find some buddies for more money.:laughing: I came back and it was down to only 6 or so open tabs and the rest would have been winners. I ran out of money again, by buddies and mine. I told the carni I needed to get some more as it was a sure thing. If I had enough money and the game wasn't rigged, it had to be a winner, no doubt about it. The game ended with the 4 guaranteed tabs open and about 20 tabs used up and that left 6 tabs where I would have to double the bet again.
I came back and lost another spin or two and now I had throw in $62 in at each spin. I was out of money again and I wanted to know how much money was in the pot. I asked the carni and he flashed it in front of me to suck me in more, so I grabbed the wad of money and spun around and ran. Right in back of me was a guy about 300# and about 6'6" and I ran over him like he was a door mat. I took off like a streak a #### right out the gate and across a busy road into a huge woods across the road. People were chasing me down hollering get the guns, get the guns, etc. but it was at night and I was cruising. I never ran so hard in my whole life. Finally at a predetermined spot where I was supposed to meet my buddies if we got separated about 3 miles away, my buddy shows up. The idiot just stood there after I took off and he got caught.
He said I have to come back and give the money back because they know who I am. Oh, Oh I'm in trouble. Anyway I came back and a cop was waiting there for me and I was sitting in the cop car and I explained what happened to me and handed the money over to him. He marched me back to the game and handed the money to the carni, and the carni said he wouldn't press charges but that all the money wasn't there.
Either I lost some cruising through the woods at 15MPH at night or the cop took his share. I have no doubt the game was super rigged and the cop was crooked. If I was smart, which I wasn't, I should have relayed the story to the General of the base. Either way I lost $100 at least of my own money and had to pay back by trusting buddies money on PFC pay in the late 60s. Maybe the pay was $100 a month so I was struggling with the bills for a while.
That was a lesson I will never forget as long as I live. Now I just go with sure things like the stock market or the lottery.
Looking back at it, I probably saved a lot of money over the years by staying out of those places, including casinos. I'm not going to justify my actions as right, but I thought it was an interesting gambling story and what it may make a person do.
