The Most Interesting Thing I Learned This Week - Roulette

At the beginning of this week, I certainly did not intend to have back-to-back posts in which I referred to France. My friend Zach would be ashamed, but thankfully, he's immersed in football season, so most likely this will go unnoticed by him.

This weekend Stacie and I loaded the dogs into the car and made a trip down to Tulsa to see my bro Trait, our sis-in-law Sara and our nephew. Though most of the weekend was filled with the sound of our nephew's glee about having puppies, him wanting Uncle Ty to go outside or other silly moments that need not be discussed here, we took a little time out on Saturday night to visit a casino. We were in Indian Territory after all.

Stacie and I had never been to a casino together and only separately for work. Neither one of us have done much gambling and wanted to wait to gamble at a casino together - you know, good family time - so we were pretty giddy heading out the door.

After Stacie had some trouble with the Wheel of Fortune slots and a black jack dealer made mincemeat of me, Stacie found a game that we both could enjoy: roulette.

I didn't win anything at roulette, but I definitely was able to sit there longer than I was during my short stay at the black jack table. Stacie on the other hand, was doing pretty well. In fact, after a few rounds she pointed to the 0/00 space on the board and asked what that was. Our pit boss, Shane, explained that along with all the red and black numbers there is also a green 0 and a green 00 that can hit.

Immediately Stacie put $5 on the line between the two, betting both and declared that they should hit now.

Sure enough, double zero hit. $85 was shoveled to my baby. She ended up walking away with a brand new $100 bill. She's still grinning about it.

I decided to do some research about this newfound game we played, and it led to interesting things.

Roulette Facts:

• Roulette is French and means "little wheel"


• Roulette has been played in its present form since 1796 in Paris


• In our hemisphere there is a zero and a double zero on the wheel, but most of the rest of the world has just a single zero space.


• To "break the bank" actually refers to winning all of the money available at a roulette table. All the money at the table is taken and a black cloth covers the table until the bank is replenished. Many people, including myself until recently, think that this saying refers to taking all of the money in a bank or casino (figuratively or literally), but that's not so.


• The most well known bank breaker was Charles Wells, who broke the bank 12 times in 11 hours in Monte Carlo in 1891. At one point he hit the correct number 23 out of 30 spins. He was not cheating, he admitted later he was just a lucky scoundrel - literally. He was playing with 4,000 Pounds that he swindled from people who had invested in his bogus invention - the musical jump rope.


• Others have cheated though. While Stacie and I were at the table a man was texting on his phone and the pit boss told him that phones were not allowed at the table. I wondered how a phone could give him an advantage. As it turns out, in 2004 three men put a laser scanner and a computer program in a phone. The laser would scan the wheel as it was spinning and predict what quadrant the ball would settle into. The men would then place bets in that quadrant and did quite nicely for themselves. Now, betting is closed at most tables before the wheel begins to slow down.

There are a lot of interesting little tidbits out there about this game - betting strategies, mathematical formulas, famous cheaters, etc. It's amazing what you can learn with a little digging, and it's always nice to have a winning experience. Especially consdering that for every $1 you bet your expected winnings are negative 5.3 cents. That is, unless, of course, you are my wife.