Lady luck has smiled on Ken Tapscott, and that’s been a really good thing for his travel habit.

In 2003, a couple of years before he decided to run for Dallas County Court-at-Law No. 4, Tapscott had saved a month of vacation while working as an senior associate with Dallas’ Baron & Budd. He planned to travel for a month in New Zealand. But before he boarded the airplane for the 22-hour trip to the island, he stopped in Las Vegas for a bit of gambling.