Las Vegas

We just got back from another great trip to Vegas. This time the group consisted of Aly (who lives out there), Ericka, Nate, Monica, and I. We stayed at the Mirage which was a small step up from my last trip out there.

One of the trip's highlights was the new Cirque du Soleil show, "Love". This was another great show - a bit different than the other Cirque shows I've seen. Lots of acrobatics, but definitely not as much as O and Mystere - equally strange but in a much more familiar way (if that makes any sense). We all really enjoyed it and I would definitely recommend checking it out.

Monnie has written up some in depth coverage of our trip, so I'll cut mine a bit short here.

I will say though that my initial search for a link to the Cirque show was just to enter "Love" into Google. #1 on the hit list was "The Love Calculator" which I had to check out.

Looks like Monnie and I are not exactly a sure thing. The site says (based strictly on your names) that we have a 44% chance of love. The description following says that we have a chance but that it will probably take "a lot of work". It also cautions that no matter how much work we put in - it can't guarantee anything.

Of course, it didn't surprise me to find that Kevin (Burg) and Monnie would have a 91% chance. He's quite the ladies man, I bet I could put kevin and about anyone in there and it would be 90%

Vegas Baby!

Just got back from a long weekend in Vegas where much fun was had by the 9 of us. We stayed at the glamourous Gold Spike hotel.

An excerpt from this review: "On the plus side, the smoke won't choke a horse like it used to. It'll just give the horse a hacking cough. Trust us, we bring horses in here all the time."

And it did live up to it's reputation. Getting checked in was a hassle of mammoth proportions: taking 45 minutes to get checked into a hotel with only one other guy in line has to be some sort of record. After that though, it was fine. You get what you pay for and when you pay $30/night for a a room with 2 beds... you aren't staying at the Bellagio.

We ended up spending most of our downtown time at The Plaza. It's a nice enough place and the table games suited us well. Burg attempted the "Big Daddy Burger Contest" but predictably fell short when he claimed he "thought it was only going to be 8 pounds".

I played at a few other places downtown including Binions. With the history that this place has, I really wanted to play some poker there - I'm glad I did, but I don't think that I really need to go back. The dealers were way under par and the room wasn't all that great - except for the history...

Most of our play on the strip was at Caesars. We watched 2 days of the NCAA tournament there, as well as playing some in their poker room. Our other NCAA games were watched at Mandalay Bay.

There was some more poker played in the very nice room of The Mirage. Not only was their room nice but they had action on Monday when it was hard to find elsewhere. One of the highlights of the trip was playing here on Sunday night with Tom Geer, a couple from the Napa Valley (who fit every stereotype there) and a completely intoxicated, muscle shirt wearing, "computer dude" from California who had stories on everything from his mormon ex-girlfriend to the lack of ice fishing in California.

All in all a great trip. Lots of fun and we'll be back again next year!

In other (big) news.

Mike took the boards! Glad that's done with and it sounds like he's already on to more crazy adventures. I don't want to ruin the story but it does involve a flashlight that makes hippo noises and changing the tire of a car while in motion (typical Mike and Sheila stuff). As usual, the 2 year old sums it up best: "That blue car is broken".

Monnie and I (as well as nana and bapa) are super pysched to be taking care of Claire now that we've finally managed to deport her parents to Brazil! I'm sure they'll have a great time and we'll get some awesome photos and blog reports. and I'm sure we'll have fun while they're away too, including (but not limited to) sliding down the giant rainbow in our backyard, as we do whenever Claire is over at our house.

Aly is moving to Vegas! We'll definitely have to meet up when we're out there in March. I'm sure a large part of the reason that she's moving out there is so that she can participate in our 15 guy all night gambleathons. Sounds like every little girls dream (well, maybe Emily K's actually).

Jon and Alison are not only recently engaged, but also have just completed their blog across Europe. Lots of photos and even a few movies for you to check out.

Back from Vegas

Monica and I got back from Las Vegas this morning and I'm very happy to report that it was an awesome trip!

My weekend was split between sightseeing (mostly in the middle of the strip, gaming and watching some football (mostly at the Stardust). Monnie built on my list with some shopping and a spa visit.

I think Steph (we were there with Mike and Steph Fox) and Monica each came in expecting to have a good time but not completely sure of what it would be like: I think they each had a great time shopping, visiting the spa, and checking out some of the incredible casino properties on the strip.

The only negative for us was on the way back home. Someone on our plane had some chest pain which caused some commotion. A doctor on the plane checked him out and we had to make a pit stop in Salt Lake City. Obviously, if the man's health was in jeopardy: we're really glad that we could stop so he could get help... but adding 2.5 hours to a red-eye flight was no fun!

There are lots of fun pictures for you to check out on Flickr! Here's a sneak preview:





One of the first things I noticed was the windows at Westward Ho had covers over them that weren't there the last time. Talking with the guy at the checkin desk, apparently they had to add them after some guy from Wisconsin reported that (before the new protective covers) the windows were "real flimsy" and could be shattered just by "knocking to see if his buddies were in there".


Mike gets caught checking out one of his favorite dolls at FAO Schwarz:

Vegas

The Vegas trip is finally right around the corner and I'm definitely excited!

This is going to be Monica and Steph's first time out there so I'm trying to come up with a list of things that should get done. Of course, we won't get to all of the things on the list but here are some of the most "noteable" sites to see in Vegas.

* Fountains @ Bellagio
* Canal @ Venecian
* Voodoo Lounge @ Rio
* Light canopy @ Freemont Street
* Sirens @ TI
* Volcano @ Mirage

What am I missing?