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In his first column of each month, John Grochowski

reports on a casino visit.

Different people look for different things in casinos. When I had my wife, Marcy, accompany me to the Four Winds Casino in New Buffalo, Mich., just across the Indiana border, she raved about the service.

Employees were friendly and helpful, but relaxed, without a forced feel. At lunch in the Willowbrook Cafe, we told the waitress we'd each have a bowl of soup and we'd split a turkey sandwich. She delivered the sandwich halves on separate plates, with plenty of chips and pickles on each - a nice little service touch that customers remember.

As for me, I enjoyed being in a casino with a large game selection. I settled in for a little Blackjack Switch, a game I don't encounter every day.

It's a blackjack variation in which you start with two bets of equal size and are dealt two hands. When it's your turn to make decisions, you may switch the second cards.

A classic example came on my fourth hand. The first card on my first hand was a 5 and the first card on my second hand was a 10. Then I was dealt an Ace on the 5, and a 6 on the 10.

At a regular blackjack table, that would be bad news - a soft 16 with Ace-5 and a hard 16 with 10-6. In Blackjack Switch, I was able to signal the dealer to flop the second hands, moving the Ace to go with my 10 and moving the 6 to go with my 5. Now I had a blackjack on one hand and could play the other starting with 11.

Blackjacks pay even money in Switch instead of the standard 3-2. That's only to be expected, since Switch brings an increase in the number of blackjacks.

And not all Switch decisions are quite so neat. What if the dealer has a 7 up and you're dealt an Ace, then a 7 on one hand, and a 10, then a 9 on the other- Do you play it as 18 and 19, or switch to strengthen one hand to 20 and weaken the other to 17-

For those who want to get deeply into Switch strategy, there's a chart online at

wizardofodds.com that gives relative value of hands. It will tell you that in that situation, 18 and 19 is a stronger combination than 17 and 20, so you'd decline to switch.

That's a matter for home study. During my visit to Four Winds, players were relying on one another, as on the hand when one woman was convinced to switch so that her two 16s became a 20 and a 12.

"I'm just a beginner," she said.

"That's all right," another woman answered. "We were all beginners once."

The dealer grinned. It was just a friendly moment in a friendly atmosphere.

John Grochowski's "Casino Answer Man" tips air at 5:18 p.m. Tuesday-Friday on WLS-AM (890).