I had passed the interview and Math tests for a table games dealer, and was admitted to gaming school. Now you are not paid to attend gaming school, money for beverages, snacks and parking comes out of your own pocket. They had a very strict set of rules about attendance, being half an hour late or leaving half an hour early would earn you half a point. A no show was a full point, as well as arriving more that one hour late or leaving one hour early, after 4 points you were not allowed to return.

There were also strict rules about dress, business casual at all times. They even provided a list of apparel that was inappropriate, but still had to speak to a few about violations. Now I was still employed and I had informed my employer that working the late night shifts on Fridays and Saturdays were going to be a problem, I was more than willing to switch with the other supervisors. I went on to tell them that if offered a position I would tell them in plenty of time to locate and train a replacement.

There were about 120 people in this academy class, so many in fact that I along with 3 others had to use one of the auxiliary tables as we could not get to the main pod of tables due to the amount of people. So for 5 days a week and 4 hours a night we were taught everything about blackjack, how to deal cards, count and stack chips, and calculate payouts. We dealt for hours at a time.

My bosses at my full time job informed me that they found a replacement. He had been a driver that left to become a tractor-trailer operator. His wife was not happy with him being gone for so many days at a time that he left that job and tried to come back as a shuttle bus driver, they offered him a supervisor's position, and I would help train him.

The mandatory drug testing was coming up fast. The coach warned all that if you got a positive response on illegal substances you were finished. You never heard so many excuses and ignorant questions from so many. When it was announced that this was not a pee-in-the-cup test, but rather a hair snip, the protests became louder.

When one male announced that he was going to shave his head and armpits, he was informed by the coach that there was hair elsewhere, and he quickly decided against shaving. We had already lost quite a few due to attendance violations and some for personal reasons, and I predicted that we would lose a lot more after the drug test, and I was correct.

With the departure of so many students I was able to move to the main teaching area, and made more friends. There was one group that became my best friends, we even had character names we used when we were pretending to be players. There was Lord Byron, The Black Widow, Casino Barbie, Kitty-licious and I was Morty, the elderly Jewish patron, and had the voice to back it up. It was a damned good time.

 About 1 week into August while on the road doing my supervisor duties, I was summoned to base by my boss. He informed me that they could not have 5 supervisors on the payroll, and no part time one. Since I could not work my full week I was considered part time. The man they hired to be my replacement was ready to work on his own according to them and I was out of a job.

They would keep me on the employment roles as an "on-call" employee, but my employment was finished. I figured it was a God sent, now I could fully concentrate on school. There was less than a month to go.