The casino’s 2,500 slot machines were, at least initially, entertaining, a hodgepodge of elaborate designs and themes that ranged from movie and television tie-ins to purely absurdist kitsch. There were games inspired by Star Wars, Alien, Casablanca, Phantom of the Opera, The Terminator, Austin Powers, Creature from the Black Lagoon, A Fistful of Dollars, Wheel of Fortune, I Dream of Jeannie, South Park, That Girl, and The Munsters. One was called Bowser’s Rock ’n’ Roll Party. There was Lucky Larry’s Lobster Mania and Super Sally’s Shrimp Mania, Cashsquatch and Cops and Donuts, Frog Prince and Flame of Olympus, Treasures of Venice and Queen of Atlantis. Dale Earnhardt, Kenny Rogers, and Evel Knievel all had their own games. This overwhelming mix displayed not just a shrewd and perverse psychological calculation on the part of the designers—there’s no doubt a refined science to th ebusiness—but also a sort of gleeful ingenuity. Clearly, slot-machine manufacturers have a firm grasp on myth and memory’s power to exploit all manner of human vulnerability. In a particularly bleary moment, I deposited my dollar into a machine called Enchanted Vatican, only to discover upon closer scrutiny that it was actually called Enchanted Unicorn.
During a later, manic stretch I was defeated in succession by Avalanche of Cash, Sneaky Devils, Jamaica Me Money, and Mariachi Madness. As I wandered from room to room, losing small amounts of money here and there and attempting to strike up conversations, I became convinced that the Evel Knievel machine was going to be my ticket to good fortune. I would return to it periodically throughout the night, even if I never did get any money out of the thing. Upon depositing your coins, Knievel’s voice would bark, “Life isn’t worth anything unless you got some gamble in you.” Periodically, the spinning tumblers would freeze and you would be provided with a “reality check bonus”: video footage of the motorcycle daredevil soaring through the air and tumbling ass-over-elbows across the handlebars. Near as I could tell, this bonus was purely for entertainment purposes.
Modern America offers all sorts of diversions for its growing legion of insomniacs. In even the smallest towns, a guy who can’t sleep can find ways to pass the time or places to rustle up a microwave burrito. There are grocery stores and oases of convenience that never close. Cable and satellite television bring hundreds of far-flung stations into the average American home, and a debased form of communication and connection is available at all hours via the Internet. But nowhere is garden-variety sleeplessness so hectored by relentless external stimulus as at a casino.
The strange, crepuscular light, sputtering with the constant flash and strobe of agitated machinery, filtered through the slowly drifting scrim of tobacco smoke, is disorienting. The noise level at Treasure Island, especially in the dead of the night, is mind-boggling. It is a pure digital Babel, albeit absent, most noticeably, of human conversation; a mash-up of seemingly every sound effect and sonic abomination capable of being produced and spit out by circuitry: blips, beeps, burps, disembodied voices, a jackhammer, the chatter of monkeys, the distorted arpeggio of an organ, the chugging of a locomotive, the rattle of coins, all manner of bells, whistles, and whooping alarms. This technological racket competes with the music leaking out of ceiling speakers (I heard Blondie, I heard Kool and the Gang, I heard Michael McDonald), both rolling together in a continuous, never-ending loop that approaches at times the most grandiose and chaotic aspirations of musique concrète composers. The most disconcerting moments come when this dense quilt of noise is occasionally punctuated by the briefest, almost-eerie pinholes of silence.
Not surprisingly, an intense headache ultimately complicated my growing feelings of disorientation and exhaustion. I lost track of time, and I lost track of money. “Lost track” is perhaps not quite accurate. I simply lost money, and after a certain point I had no idea how much money I had lost. Shoving dollar bills into slot machines and video poker games rather quickly became an exercise in abject abstraction. Occasionally a machine would sputter and clang and a few credits would be added to the tally on the video screen. But by the time I was done pressing buttons and pulling handles I’d have nothing to show for my investment, an investment that was entirely devoid of hope or expectation.
Nor did the other players scattered around the casino display any sense of hope or expectation. They mostly sat alone, usually smoking, often nursing a cup of coffee, all the while staring blankly at the consoles in front of them and going through the same routine over and over. As I trolled the aisles, it seemed that some of these folks never budged from one particular row. A plump, hennaed woman who looked to be in her seventies spent most of the night camped in front of a Sizzling Seven slot, and over time the floor beneath her chair became crowded with plastic cups heaped with change.