Controlling Destiny
Everything you ever wanted to know about luck, fate and fortune
by Frank Scoblete

Casino gamblers believe in luck. So, not surprisingly, casinos sell the dream that anyone can have amazing luck in order to lure players onto their properties. Blown-up pictures of ecstatic people brandishing outrageous outsized checks dot the landscape of many highways leading to and from the nation's casinos. They are there for a very good reason: to whet our appetite for getting lucky. We can't help but think some not-so-charitable thoughts when we see them. After all, "If that idiot on the billboard can win a million, why can't I?"

Of course, the casinos themselves don't believe in luck and they certainly don't rely on luck to win magical amounts of money from us. The casinos believe in math (and I don't mean numerology). They believe in the power of percentages and short pays, not in the power of magic stones, amulets and omens.

But math isn't mystical. It holds no charms for the average person, and it doesn't tell us any truths about our psyches or ourselves. For that, we have to turn to superstition, myth and legend.

I can't say that the following information will get your picture up on one of those billboards that blight the land, because... well...because it's bad form to presume about one's fate. But, knock on wood, I can say this with a degree of confidence: You want to know about luck? You want to be able to understand the profoundly confounding relationships between this, that and those other things that really drive the engines of the mystical universe? Then throw some salt over your shoulder, and read on!

Luck and Omens
Luck is often thought of as a force of the universe. Frequently, it's tied up with omens that alert us to good or ill fortune on the horizon.

Most people know about the bad luck that can come from black cats crossing our paths. The black cat, often thought of as a witch's "familiar" (an evil spirit that inhabits an animal and does the bidding of its human master), goes back to medieval times.

Another animal, the hare or rabbit, goes even further back to prehistory. Its crossing of one's path could cause calamity beyond measure.

Indeed, when discussing a rabbit's foot, many would-be wits will chuckle and quip, "Well that foot wasn't too lucky for the rabbit was it?" What they don't realize is, by cutting off a rabbit's foot, you're taking the rabbit's luck into your own hands! By having a rabbit's foot, you are now in control of the forces of fate.

In addition to cats and hares, birds can also portend good or bad luck. The poem that reads "four-and-twenty blackbirds baked in a pie" actually symbolizes death (pity the poor king who had this dish "placed before" him!). Blackbirds are often considered an omen that someone in the family is about to die. In fact, in some myths, blackbirds escort the souls of the dead to heaven or to hell. These souls would be seen "Nevermore!" to quote another bird that symbolizes death-the raven.

The extinct cuckoo bird could predict good and bad luck. If you heard your first cuckoo bird of the day from the left, it meant things would not be going your way. If it came from the right, the day was yours. The reason the cuckoo is extinct is obvious-sooner or later, every cuckoo heard some other early-rising cuckoo on his left. Ultimately, only one cuckoo was left standing.

Left Out; Right On
Naturally, as all left-handers know, the left side is the evil side, whereas the right side is the good side-which explains why Mark McGwire ultimately surpassed Babe Ruth and Roger Maris! Those evil lefties couldn't keep the righteous righty down.

In fact, there was a time in history when the fear of left-handedness caused parents to take extraordinary care in the training of their children. If a child had a tendency towards the left, it was thought that he would be easier game for Satan. Some cultures even killed their left-handers.

Dog Days
Dogs play a role in omens as well. If you should see three white dogs or even a single spotted dog when you go about your daily chores, that heralds all sorts of good things coming your way. Even better, if you're followed home by a stray dog, it's usually a sign of great good luck-especially for the dog, who'll probably get it's first good meal in days!

Readers of the great novelist Amy Tan are well acquainted with the role that luck plays in Chinese culture. In fact, it's not unusual for people in China to breed dogs specifically for their luck-giving properties. For example, if you can breed a dog that looks like a tiger, you are assured a promotion. (I have no idea what happens if you breed a tiger that looks like a dog-maybe it eats you.)

If a dog or cat crosses your path from the right, it's good luck. From the left (I do feel sorry for you left handers), it's the worst of all possible luck and probably means you or someone you loved is about to be escorted to you-know-where by some blackbirds. According to a Chinese custom, if a strange cat or dog enters your home, it's terrific good luck (unless they aren't housebroken, in which case it's just plain messy).

Big Fish Eat Little Fish
Sailors don't need Steven Spielberg to know that if a shark follows their ship, it doesn't mean happy sailing. The same applies to surfers. And coastal peoples have a superstition that if a baby is born as the tide is coming in, the child will have a charmed life. But if the baby is born when the tide is going out, he's in for misery.

If you dream about fish, you'll have good luck the very next day, so plan your gambling accordingly. (If, however, you dream about sharks, you might win in the casino, but get eaten when you visit the new shark exhibit at Mandalay Bay in Vegas.)

Bug Off
Even insects can get into the omen act. Why not? They get into everything else.

A swarm of bees settling into your garden means that prosperity is on the way. (Of course, if it's a swarm of African "killer" bees, as Las Vegas is now experiencing, you'd better have plenty of prosperity. You'll need it to pay the doctor bills after the swarm attacks you.)

Stepping on a praying mantis will bring you awful luck, as God protects those who pray. Also, never kill a lady bug because your children will have bad luck.

Here's an important one: In the months of October, November and December, never kill any flying insects at all. You'll lose you one hundred dollars for every flying insect that you kill during those three months. (Need proof? Have any of you ever seen an exterminator win at a blackjack table in October, November or December? I rest my case.)

Inanimate Omens
Our superstitions don't stop at the line between the living and the dead. Inanimate objects can also hold within their beings good or evil. Everyone knows that if you break a mirror, it's seven years of bad luck-usually starting with having to replace the mirror. If a picture of someone falls from the wall or the shelf, the person pictured will die. If, on the other hand, the person whose picture fell is already dead, that means he's trying to contact you from the other side-probably to tell you to replace the frame.

Any change in the rhythm of a clock will result in some harm to individuals who hear the change. This is why it's wise to go digital.

While a person is cooking, if the bacon curls, it's a sign that a new and exciting lover awaits the cook. So, men, tell your wives that from now on you'll cook the bacon. Instead, tell her to shell peas. Explain to her that you'll reward her with her favorite present, however expensive, if she can find nine perfect peas in a single pod. It's worth it, guys, because if a woman finds nine perfect peas in a single pod, she'll be faithful to you forever.

Before a major event, if you feel itching or tingling on the right side, that means the event will go in your favor. If you feel it on the-you guessed it-bad news. The legends never state whether induced itching works as well as natural itching. If it does, the next time you're in a casino, put itching powder on your right side and scratch to your heart's content. (You'll also have the good fortune of being allowed to play at the table alone, as other players will think you have lice.)

People Portents
Unfortunately, even people are looked upon as omens. If the first person you see in the day is a man or woman whose eyebrows meet over his or her nose, it means very bad luck is on the way. You never want to run into anyone who is cross-eyed as they, too, bring bad luck. Cross-eyed people are said to possess the "Evil Eye." And a person with big bucked teeth-Sorry, I forgot that we live in politically correct times. Change that to "a person with a pronounced overbite"-will also bring bad luck, except to his or her orthodontist.

Also, stupid people and morons will bring you bad luck-especially if they are on your blackjack team. And I must reiterate: Left-handers bring bad luck. So stay away from them.

Heaven Sent; Earth Spent
The very heavens can be interpreted in any number of ways. If the sky is cloudy, it probably means it's going to rain. If it's sunny, it probably means it isn't going to rain. Okay, that's not so incredible. But if it rains on a day when a great king gets sick; that means the king won't recover. If it's sunny, he will recover. (If I were a great king, I'd live in Nevada where it's sunny just about every day. I'd be immortal!)

Speaking of mortality...The earth has never been guaranteed to live forever. Indeed, most religions teach that the end of the world will be heralded by certain omens, usually earthquakes, wars, floods, fires and the like. Did you know that in some prophecies, the end of the world will be heralded by a comet? Did you know that a huge comet is now heading for our general vicinity? Luckily, if you believe in science, the comet is going to miss us. If you believe in prophecy you had better eat, drink and be merry for tomorrow won't be just "another day." Trust me.

If you don't believe in science, you can always take the liver of an animal, smash it on the floor, and read the future in the spray of the tissues. Or you can take the entrails of an animal and do the same thing. This is called "divination." It's also called "messy." Its formal name is "extispicium," which is the art of reading the future in very messy, disgusting things. The ancient Egyptians used to do this regularly, though, thankfully, you won't find the practice replicated at Luxor.

If you prefer your divination sans nausea, you could always read the wind. Build a fire and make a sacrifice to the god of your choice. Then watch to see where the smoke goes. If the smoke goes up into the sky, incredible good fortune awaits you. Head for the casino. If the smoke blows to the right, it means pretty good fortune-maybe play a few keno tickets. But if the smoke blows to your left, it means bad fortune. Stay home. Finally, if the smoke blows right at you, run. It probably means you're about to be toast.

There is a way around the left-right smoke-blowing problem. As you light the fire, check which way the wind is blowing and just position yourself so that the smoke must blow to your right. Better still, wait for a perfectly calm day before making any sacrifices. That way, you'll assure yourself great good fortune. Had Cain done this (you'll recall that his sacrifice was rejected by God), he might never have felt compelled to knock off Abel (whose sacrifice was accepted by God). The formal reading of omens in smoke, by the way, is called "capnomancy," and it comes with a warning from the Surgeon General.

These are only a few of the wonderful omens that have had men and women scurrying around like chickens with their heads cut off (a bad omen if the chicken falls near you) in an attempt to harness the forces of luck.

Luck, Fate and Divine Providence
Naturally, luck is not only tied up in omens; by extension, it's also tied up with fate. After all, how can an omen omenize if the future weren't in some way predictable?

Yet the future must also be malleable because by knowing an omen's meaning, you might be able to avoid the consequences. If, for example, you spill salt (bad luck in the future), you just throw some salt over your shoulder and you can change it to good luck, or at least cancel out the presaged bad luck. That is, unless the salt you just flung hits a huge guy named Butch who's eating in the booth behind you-then it's really bad luck coming your way, and not all that far in the future.

Luck and Fate have often been personified as women-Lady Luck, Dame Fortune-but always women of, shall we say, "easy virtue." In the play Macbeth, William Shakespeare characterized luck as a "whore" who will give her favors to anyone, even rebels and traitors. Still, Shakespeare shows clearly that skill can ultimately defeat luck, if those who possess that skill are fighting on the side of right. (Good omen for card counters!)

In ancient Greece, the Goddess of Fate was Nemesis, which literally meant she was the enemy of man-especially men who had grown rich and powerful. She delighted in bringing such high personages to low ends (high rollers, watch out!). As time went on, the Greeks added many layers to their concept of fate. By the time of the Golden Age, there were three main goddesses of fate (sometimes known as "The Three Fates" or "The Three Sisters"). Each was responsible for a different aspect of our lives: Clotho, who creates man's destiny like cloth on a spinning wheel; Lachesis, who weaves our day-to-day luck, and Atropos, the one who cuts life's string with her scissors to bring death. In both the Scandinavian and Germanic cultures, fate was also looked upon as a female trio.

Mythology and literature are replete with stories of men (and some women) who attempt to thwart fate, trick fate, and achieve immortality. Rarely do they succeed. Even Adam and Eve, whose original destiny seemed secure and wonderful, fell from grace and fated all men and women who would come after them to death and decay. And all the searches for the Tree of Life, the Fountain of Youth, and the 24-Hour Craps Roll have thus far resulted in failure.

In every culture and every era, luck or fate, whether personified as a woman or simply as a blind force of nature, is known to be fickle and unpredictable. It can change from good to bad in the blink of an eye. Just ask any casino player.

Of course, hotshot scientists like Albert Einstein who think they know everything claim that God doesn't "play dice with the universe"-in short, that God doesn't gamble. Oh, yeah? Well, just look at the story of Job from the Bible.

Everything was going swimmingly for him until one day God and Satan made a wager concerning the nature of Job's loyalty to God. Satan claimed that Job was loyal to God because God had rewarded him with a big and loving family, a big house, and plenty of cattle and sheep and servants. God claimed that Job was loyal because Job loved God and it had nothing to do with all that material prosperity. Satan then said fine, let me nail him with calamity and we'll see just how loyal Job really is. The die was cast, so to speak, and God allowed Satan to kill off all of Job's cattle and sheep, then all of Job's family, and finally, to inflict horrible pain on Job himself.

The classic picture of Job is on an ash heap scratching his itchy boils and bemoaning his fate. Like a slot player who's just ratcheted away his jackpot, Job had no idea why his world had suddenly gone sour. He had no idea that he was merely a puppet in a wager, a human ping-pong ball blowing around a drum in a heavenly keno game. Indeed, when Job finally got to talk to God and asked Him to explain why all this evil had happened to him, God essentially told him to "Dummy up and play the cards I've dealt you!"

Like Job, losing casino gamblers often scratch their heads and wonder why calamity has befallen them. Why did they lose that bet, those bets, their entire bankrolls? Perhaps they missed some omen that would have alerted them to the illfate awaiting them. Perhaps they had not understood that Luck is no lady and will give her favors to whomever she will. Perhaps it's best not to question God's handling of your fate, least you also be told to "Dummy up and play the cards I've dealt you."

Increase Good Luck, Decrease Bad Luck
Okay, now that I've made you see the dimensions of the luck problem, I'm going to give you concrete steps you can take to avoid bad luck, or to change bad luck to good or, better still, to bring good luck to you. Use these and they are guaranteed to bring you Fortune's favor. At the very least, they'll keep annoying relatives away from you (they'll all think you're crazy). And that, in itself, is good fortune.

Before you take a sip of a drink in a casino, blow on it. It doesn't matter if the liquid is hot or cold. Blow on it! You see, when a liquid is first put into a container of any kind, it falls asleep. If you drink it before you wake it up, you'll die...if not in actual life, then at the tables and the machines. But if you blow on your drink, the liquid wakes up, and with it, your good luck.

White horses should be avoided at all times. If you see one, you will lose money. That's why Excalibur made so much money from people who watched King Arthur's Tournament. All those white horses!

Once in a casino, if you are experiencing a losing streak, pull a pig's tail. If you can't find a pig in a casino, pull the ham out of a person's sandwich. However, make sure it's a little person's sandwich, as this gesture could bring bad luck if the person is big, mean, and hungry.

Speaking of food, always keep the skin of a banana you have just eaten in your pocket. It will bring good luck for a 24 hours (then it will start to stink). And if you really want additional good luck at the tables or machines, every time you win a bet spit on the chips or on the coins that come out of the machine. Yes, the dealers will think you're disgusting. Yes, your fellow slot players will shun you. But who cares? You're winning. If the dealers or your fellow slot players hurt your feelings, when you're finished with your session of successful spit-play, leave that rotten banana skin on the floor and see what kind of luck it brings them when they step on it.

Here are some more helpful hints to make you lucky in a casino. Always wear a Sugalite stone on your person and bad luck can't touch you. But you must cleanse it in sea salt each week, as Sugalite absorbs bad luck and the sea salt takes away the bad luck that the stone has absorbed. I guess it's also possible that you could wear some sea salt around your neck and cut out the middleman.

Any green stone rubbed three times before a decision will bring good luck. Always wear a green stone so that it is visible.

And never cut your fingernails on a Friday or Sunday. Cut them on a Monday and you'll definitely win games of chance.

If you can catch a leaf as it's falling, you will have immediate good luck, so try to play in casinos that have a lot of trees around them.

And if you should see a pin on the floor, pick it up, and for 24 hours you'll win. You can pin your hopes on that one. (Sorry, I couldn't resist!)

The Bottom Line of Luck
You can smash all the livers you want onto the floor; you can avoid all those black cats and hares and cross-eyed, left-handed people; you can burn your sacrifices in the still cool of the morning and you can cut your fingernails every Monday from now to eternity, and you know what? You'll still have a one-in-six chance of sevening out on the next roll. And that's why I am not superstitious. That, and I've found that being superstitious brings me bad luck. Â

Frank Scoblete is the number one best-selling gaming author in the country. His latest book is Forever Craps: The Five-Step Advantage-Play Method. He also publishes his own magazine, Chance and Circumstance and has his own website at www.scoblete.com at RGT Online. For a free catalog, call: 1-800-944-0406 or write to: Paone Press, Box 610, Lynbrook, NY 11563.