Although the game of keno is conducted in the keno lounge, you do not have to go to the lounge to play. The casino provides blank keno tickets in its restaurants, bars, and various lounge areas. These areas are patrolled by attractive young ladies in very short dresses who are known as runners.
If you want to play, simply fill out a ticket and call over a runner when you see one. Or have any casino employee call one for you. The runner can also provide you with blank tickets and crayon if need be. She will take your ticket and your bet to the keno lounge and register the ticket for you. A couple of minutes later, she will bring you the duplicate ticket. These same lounge areas contain electronic boards, just like the one in the keno drawing, the runner will come around again on her rounds. IF you have won, she will verify the win for you using her draw ticket, and she will even take your duplicate ticket down to the counter, collect your winnings, and bring them back to you. This makes keno the only casino game you can play while simultaneously engaging in some other activity, such as having a snack in the coffee shop or trying to pick up a young lady at the bar. However, note the disclaimer the appears in small print on each keno ticket:
"Keno runners are available for your convenience. We are not responsible if tickets are too late for current game. " The keno runner will do her best to get your ticket in before the next drawing begins. If she fails, she will return your ticket and your money when she comes back on her rounds. At that point, you will have the option of either having her play the ticket for the next game of forgetting about the whole thing. However, if your numbers have come up on the game you missed, you can't sue the casino. If you have had a religious revelation that your numbers are going to hit on the very next game, you had better run down to the keno lounge and play the ticket yourself.
Casinos run keno games continuously, twenty-four hours a day. There is no exact time limit. About eight to ten games are conducted each hour, so that two hundred or more games are played in each casino each day, each one running six to eight minutes. Tickets are accepted on these games at all times, except during each drawing, which takes about two minutes. A supervisor sitting behind the keno writers decides when to close each game. At that point, the word CLOSE is lit up on the keno board and no more bets can be made for that particular game. As soon as the drawing is concluded, tickets may be submitted for the next game.
