America's Funniest (Unseen) Videos

At one time, my former Surveillance room had a compilation tape. Granted, we produced no shortage of compilation tapes for official use. But not this one. This one had nothing to do with high profile cases. Nor of accumulated gaming criminals or cheats. Not even of training aids.

No, this compilation tape was our room's official 'blooper' tape. If it was something we reviewed, and it was funny to us -- funny being rather subjective -- it was added to the 'blooper' tape.

The tape got sizeable, with the best of casino 'blooper' moments we in Surveillance had observed for found during a review. It wasn't unusual for local authorities to stop by on a "walk-thru", and ask to see the video, or show it to their colleagues.

On it, were moments to remember. Employee and guest falls that were downright comical. A guest sneaking up behind and 'goosing' a slot tech on the casino floor. A security supervisor, talking to an intoxicated guest, who tried to 'goose' him three times during the chat. An employee, in the middle of the gaming floor, picking his nose and wiping it on a slot chair. A cocktail waitress, losing her balance and her drink tray in spectacular fashion. Two drunk females, making out with each other in the lounge, with mouths full of food. A security officer watching the drop team, falling asleep on his feet and falling backward when he did so. Women exposing their chests for the band, or a bus group. And some unexplained occurrences, all attributed to "Abner", the casino ghost (for another time).

Of course, the video had it's favorite moments, as rated by room observers, supervisors, and some of the outside agencies who had the opportunity to see the 'unacknowledged' video. For instance:

- we got a call to do a review on where the contents of a strap of $50 bills had gone. The observer assigned wasn't told the whole story. So he cued it up ... and snickered ... *rewind*... guffawed ...*rewind*... LOL ... at this point, my curiosity was aroused. He cued it up again ... ROFL ...*rewind*... now the casino shift manager has arrived ... LOAO ...*rewind*. In short, the cashier put the strap of $50s in a bill counter. What it should have done was run the bills through, and verify the strap was proper in quantity. INSTEAD...when the cashier hit the button, the entire strap of $5,000 in $50s went up in the cashier's face, and all over the carousel. And yes, all of the $50s were accounted for.

- a main cage cashier fell in the cage. As SOP, Surveillance did a review for the incident report that Security had to fill out. The cashier herself was insistent that she was fine, and no report was needed. She was overruled by her supervisor. I got the review. What it showed: the cage consisted of five windows with a narrow aisle to walk thru between the cashiers and the wall where the jetsorts (for coin) were. This particular cashier was working in Window 4 at the time. She apparently decided she needed to adjust her shoe. Instead of bending over to do it, she picked up her left foot, raised it, and crossed it across her right leg, balancing on her right foot. And promptly lost that balance to the left, hopping madly on one foot trying to regain that lost balance...past Window 3...past Window 2..accelerating...past Window 1 and *KE_RASH* into the office at the end. I can only imagine how it looked to guests in the other windows at the time...

- the security supervisor called up to request a review, one he sounded rather dubious about. Seems he'd been told that an elderly woman got her head 'caught' in one of the passenger elevator doors on the second floor. The woman herself was not hurt, just embarrassed. What with the safety features of the elevators, he didn't believe her story. So I was in the process of cueing it up, just as the supervisor arrived. A rather dry-humored, laconic sort, he wasn't one to display emotion to any great degree. He almost never laughed. So I began the playback: the short, elderly woman, stooped in stature, had pushed the button for the elevator. The car to her right opened. She shuffled toward it, stooped forward. But not fast enough: the very outer doors of the elevator shut before she could enter. On both sides of her forward-leaning head. And for several seconds, there she appeared, stuck and not moving, making no effort to back away from the doors. Until a bypasser ran up and separated the doors (her head hadn't made contact with the inner doors with all the safety features). I have never seen that supervisor laugh harder or longer. The rest of us were no better off.

- when I first went to Surveillance, the arcade for minors (attached to the deli) was a sizeable affair, with about 25 arcade games in it. Of course, we had a camera to monitor the goings on therein. Our camera -- a moveable, pan-tilt-zoom one -- was parked broadside to an authentic penny arcade horse. The horse was, in the words of America, a "horse with no name". Until one night. We observed a couple and their daughter -- IDed by Security as having just turned 21 -- go into the arcade. Therein, while daughter mounted the horse, Mom put in a penny. And for the next 25-30 seconds, a display was put on for three male Surveillance observers that was nothing short of pure sexual fantasy (she did everything on the back of that horse but strip). From that night forward, the we named the horse 'Lucky'. Two observers needed cigarettes afterward.

- another carousel cashier was moving bags of slot tokens (600 to a bag, and about 33 pounds each), when she dropped one on her foot. The ten second long, one-legged dance she did, was worthy of the Three Stooges.

- what came to us as a reported fall by a patron, turned out to have been a patron who -- after some extended care, courtesy of her friendly (if unattentive) casino pharmacist -- tried to get up from her slot chair, tangled her leg with one of the chair, and fell sideways...taking two unbraced persons to her left with her. It looked just like falling dominos.

- and one fall on the escalator, where a rather obese woman lost her balance and literally 'rolled' backward, taking two people behind her down with her.

Sadly, that 'blooper' tape was not allowed to survive. Not that it could ever have seen the light of day beyond the Surveillance room...but I sure do miss the famous "Lucky" sequence ;-)