PT's Pub N Rainbow Way | Nevada Tavern with Games, Dining & Full Bar

I'd been coming to PT's maybe once a month for years, just playing twenty bucks here and there on my lunch breaks. My car nedeed new brakes and I was dreading the repair bill when I sat down at that machine. Three symbols lined up and suddenly the whole screen lit up—I just froze. My hands were shaking so bad I could barely press the button to call the attendant. I kept thinking this can't be real, but when they handed me that check I started crying right there. My wife thinks I should invest it, but honestly, I'm putting half toward her student loans and taking her on that trip to Arizona we've been talking about forever.

I'm not really a gambler, but my buddies dragged me to PT's for my birthday and said I had to try blackjack since I've never played before. We're sitting at the table and I'm honestly nervous—I'm asking questions about everything, hitting when maybe I shouldn't. But the dealer kept busting and I kept winning hand after hand. At one point my friend grabbed my arm and was like, 'Dude, you're actually doing this.' By the time I cashed out I couldn't believe what happened. We celebrated with dinner, and I'm using the rest to pay down my mortgage—feels wierd not having a monthly payment hanging over my head.

I've been playing in the Tuesday night poker games at PT's for almost three years, so when they announced the tournament I signed up without hesitation. I was nervous going in but I'd studied tournament strategy all month. Made it to the final table and I was sweating through my shirt—there were some really good players there. I got lucky on a couple hands but I also made some solid reads and it paid off. When I won, the whole room erupted and I just sat there grinning like an idiot. I finally paid off my ex-wife's medical debt from her cancer treatment, which was eating at me, and I'm setting the rest aside for my kids' college funds.

My sister was visiting from out of state and she's always wanted to try roulette but was too nervous to play herself. So I said I'd give it a shot for fun and let her pick the numbers. She chose my nephew's birthday and my daughter's birthday, and we were just laughing at how ridiculous it was. The ball landed and we both screamed—I've never seen my sister's face like that. I was shaking so much I had to sit down. She's a teacher and barely makes enough, so I'm giving her half and using the rest to finally redo our kitchen that's been falling apart for years.

I usually stick to my budget of fifty bucks when I come in, but I'd had a rough week at work and decided to throw an extra hundred at the Buffalo machine. I wasn't really paying attention, just kind of zone out with those games, and then the machine started going crazy. I had to read the screen like four times to understand what I was seeing. The guy next to me congratulated me before I even really processed it myself. My dad's hearing aids have been broken for months because he couldn't afford new ones—that's the first thing I'm fixing. The rest is going into savings because honestly, I'm still in shock about the whole thing.

I was killing time before meeting my wife for dinner and decided to play a few hands of Three Card Poker—it's usually my game because I understand it better than the others. I won the first couple hands, felt confident, and stayed longer than I planned. Next thing I know I'm up almost forty grand and my wife's probably wondering where I am. I called her immediately and she didn't believe me, thought I was pranking her. We used it to finally take that family vacation we've been postponing, and honestly the rest is just sitting in the bank making me feel less anxious about bills for the first time in years.