Atlantic City

There will be some people who will scoff if you were to say that Atlantic City is an amazing town.
Ignore them.  And send them to Vegas.



 I have the pleasure of living near AC and this past Saturday night that's where we decided to spend our evening.

I should mention now that I am not the gambling type as I have far better things to do with my money than give it away.  That, and I come from a family of gambling addicts and as a rule I'm pretty


disgusted by the mentality of "I think I'm really gonna hit this time".  Or the infamous "when/if I hit it big..." as a life plan.  The gambling sickness is so deep within my family members that I never once took a single vacation with my family as a child that was not based on gambling. And when we were on vacation I was often left alone to my own devices while they went and gambled.  When we weren't on vacation, I was often left with relatives who had no business sitting for a child for an extended period of time while my family members flew off to gamble in Vegas.  Fortunately I was too smart to ever get in an real trouble or mischief.  I also had an inordinate amount of street smarts before my peers.  I was always alone doing alone things.  You tend not to advertise to your normal friends and their parents that your parents aren't around a lot so I kept a lot of secrets and had a lot of solo adventures.  The beginnings of learning to love my own company.

Decades later I am still waiting for one of my relatives to hit it big, a fact that pisses them off when I remind them that it has eluded them up to this very minute.  Of course, I hope one day they prove me wrong and all the hundreds of thousands of dollars they've gambled away (no joke) comes back to them.
Until then I remain skeptical, dream killer that (they believe) I am.
I get it when people take a hundred bucks to go play around with and have fun; I balk when they take thousands they shouldn't be spending (losing) and then they can no longer afford their house or car or child support payments.  Big difference there.

Still, I love Atlantic City - just not for its gambling.  Atlantic City is real.  I used to feel that way about New York City until it became what it is today: expensive and overrated and - horror of all horrors - trendy.  As a  personal rule, once too many people show up it's time to go someplace else.
Why pay $20 for a cocktail when you can get it for $6 elsewhere?  Please don't tell me atmosphere.


AC is as dirty and scary and gritty as it is beautiful.  Its history alone is breathtaking.  On Saturday night we drove through its streets, me with camera stuck out the passenger window (it was raining)...the ghetto streets, the casino streets, the brand new neighborhood with the shiny condominiums streets.  We had a cocktail at and walked through Gardiner's Basin, then walked through the Tropicana where we saw all walks of life, out for Saturday night fun.  Men who looked straight out of casting for The Sopranos...beautiful bachelorette party girls who drink shriek too much and wear really, really short dresses...the homeless...elderly couples ready for some slot action...and on and on it goes.  It's almost too much to take in, especially for me since I overload easily on too much noise and stimuli. Also, it cost $15 to park for about an hour (what we paid at Tropicana)...so bear that in mind.

Atlantic City has a lot of problems and I hope it can rebound from them...but no so much that it turns into Vegas. I don't have anything in particular against Las Vegas, mind you - I've never even been there - but to me it seems like the equivalent of a Kardashian: a whole lot of glitz with not a lot of substance or character. AC hasn't lost all of its character yet and I would hate to see that happen to it.

My recommendation if you go to AC is to not spend all your time inside the casinos or the outlet stores.  Be safe, but do explore.

i love these houses - the ones that stood their ground...

...against this.  i think this image captures atlantic city perfectly.

see the 'denied' sign taped to the security window?  wow, what's that all about?

absecon lighthouse - right smack in the middle of the city 

hmmmm...something seems to be missing?  (hint: POTUS)

party girls in short dresses.  i'm not sure what's sticking off the top of their heads.
it seemed to be LBD (little black dress) night or is that every night in AC ?

the quarter, tropicana - lots of hustling and bustling.  it is not quiet here.

the striped shirt guy was sneaking a smoke just feet away from the oblivious security guard who was engrossed in his phone.

rainy saturday night in AC.