Easy Money – Mongolian Blackjack

Of all the seminars that I produced for Stuart Wilde, his Easy Money Blackjack seminar was one of his most successful although short lived. The basis of Easy Money was written in Stuart’s fourth book, The Quickening, published in 1988. It completed the collection of books known as the “Taos Quartet”. In the book Stuart introduced the concepts of “turbo thought.” After writing The Quickening, Stuart journeyed to Las Vegas, Nevada to apply, “turbo thought” to the casino game of blackjack. His trials at the Mirage’s blackjack tables were quite successful. He never lost. A few years later, Stuart created Easy Money, Mongolian Blackjack.

In his typical fashion, “Easy Money” was a bigger than life. The seminar spanned three days, including a trip to Harrah’s casino in Reno, for live blackjack. My company, White Dove International, promoted the blackjack seminars in the United States, Great Britain, and Australia.

Easy Money was held first at the Resort at Squaw Creek, in Squaw Valley, California. Squaw Valley was home to the 1960 Winter Olympics. The hotel property was established in the late eighties. The blackjack seminar was a black tie affair, with cocktail service, classical music, and, of course, 14 blackjack tables.

After the Friday evening program, a few of the “Warriors” headed down to the lounge for a night cap. (A number of people attending the blackjack program, had just finished Stuart’s “Warrior’s Wisdom” 7 day program, in the mountains of Taos, New Mexico) Russian Roulettes were the Mongolian Warriors’ drink of choice. It was a somewhat complicated drink to create properly. One starts with a shot of vodka, with a float of Galliano. Then a lemon wheel is added on top of the glass with a half spoon of sugar. The sugar was then soaked in 151 Rum and set on fire. Once the fire was out, we’d drink the shot and eat the cooked sugary lemon. Not that any one was counting, but eight shots comes to mind. Well, you can see that creating a Russian Roulette is labor intensive. With 13 customers requesting the drink, the bartender soon gave up the bottles of booze to the willing customers. Everything was going well, until the seventh or eighth round… But, like I said, no one was counting.

Trouble began when the woman who was pouring the 151 became unsteady. Go figure. Rum spilled all over the table, and unknown to us, in a darkened lounge, it was dripping on to the floor. When the shots went flambé, the rum on the table caught fire. Now cut to a visual of rum dripping off the table. Next, add a sound track, flewhup, flewhup, flewhup, as the ignited rum dripped over the edge of the table and on to the floor. Last, add the aroma of burning carpet. That could be the reason eight shots were the limit.

Anyway, the next year, Stuart I drove all day across the Nevada desert from Las Vegas to Tahoe for another blackjack gig at the resort. We managed to check-in just as the bar was closing. Of course, Stuart wasn’t about to let the bar shut before we had at least one drink. Stuart stuffed a fifty in the bartender’s pocket and told the bloke, “We’ll have two Russian Roulettes.” Of course, Stuart had to explain the drink. When Stuart got to the part where the rum is ignited, the bartender interrupted with sad news. The bartender told us that no flaming drinks were allowed, a hotel rule. He went on to say, that the year before, a bunch of rowdies nearly burned the place down with flaming drinks. Stuart turned to me in disgust and said, “What a bunch of arses they must have been. Mate, what are you going to have after that long drive? How about a Patron instead?”

After retiring from Easy Money in 1993, Stuart handed over the “keys” to me, so to speak. After a couple of years, doing research, with a lot of time at the tables, I created “Blackjack for Winners”. I produced my first program in November of 1995. The Do’s and Don’ts of Dice program followed, about a year and a half later, in 1997.

With an active data base of over 35,000 names, I produced 7-9 gaming programs a year, while living in Taos, New Mexico. Most of the programs were held at the Five Star Hotel, El Dorado, in Santa Fe, New Mexico. Over the years, I held a few in Albuquerque, Denver, and Las Vegas.

I began writing “Blackjack for Winners™” playbook in 1995. I’ve updated the book over the years to keep up with rule changes by casinos.