On Saturday, December 11, I was at Casino Magic in Bossier City looking for $5 chips in their millenium series. I'm $1 chip collector and don't normally go for LE's/GO's or other commemoratives, so I don't know the best way to acquire these items from casinos.

In Louisiana, you can't buy chips at the cashier's cage--only at the tables. This is no problem for me usually in getting my singles: find an empty craps or roulette table, and get a stack of whites. Sometimes I'll get a strange look if I'm buying only $3 worth at a $10 minimum table, but I always walk away with the chips. If the casino's chips are worn I'll get a larger stack, and the keep the good ones and redeem the bad ones.

Now trying to get a *particular* chips out of a dealer's rack can be tricky. Once I was trying to get a commemorative at the Lady Luck in Lula, Mississippi. I went to a woman who was manning an empty table. I told her very politely that I was looking for a particular chip, and could she help me out. She replied nastily, "I'm not going though all these chips for that!" Like she had something better to do.

So with that in mind, I was checking out the tables at Casino Magic looking for the best place to go to work. There was one empty craps table, so I started there. I said to the dealer, "Hi, I'm a collector, and I'm looking for the $5 millenium chips."

She replied, "Which ones?"

"Uh, all of them," I answered.

Her eyes moved over to the red chips, while mentioning that she thought that the latest release, '71-'80, had a cute design. She pulled a couple of $5's that were easily accessible. She then explained to the boxman what she was doing.

Then she and the boxman and even the other dealer started TEARING UP THE ENTIRE STASH of $5 chips. I couldn't believe it. Stack upon stack was tipped onto the felt. The stickman was arranging the found chips, figuring out which were missing. When they couldn't find more than one '11-'20, they got the *floorman* to check another table. I had five casino employees simultaneously looking for these things. Eventually, they found everything I was looking for. I was so astonished, I toked them $5.

So don't get discouraged if some dimwitted dealer looks at you like an alien for collecting chips...the nice ones *are* out there, waiting to be found.

Kevin.