I’m back from my Vegas trip. I got back last night actually, I was in my apartment right before 4pm. That actually worked out nice because it left me with plenty of time to get settled in and get some things finished, and not feel like I was rushed to work today.
The traveling to Vegas seemed like it too a lot longer than I had expected. I left work at 1:30, got to the airport at 2:30 and did not fly out until almost 5. I totally miscalculated my time. I kept thinking that my plane left at 4 (it was actually 4:53) so I arrived to make that time, and ended up with an extra hour. Francisco drove me to the airport, and I didn’t want to keep him waiting around with me for very long because the parking there is not cheap, so I spent most of my wait alone.
My flight from Austin to Dallas was ok, nothing too bad, although I did feel a little bit nauseous from the altitude change. It made my sinuses hurt and I had a lot of pressure. I hooked up with Kristi in Dallas. That airport is crazy big. You have to ride sky trams from one terminal to the next, and let me just give you fair warning, when they say that the door on the tram are about to close, they ain’t playing. I saw this old lady almost get crushed by the doors, and they did not re-open like they do on an elevator. Nope, they snap shut and will take your arm or leg with them. Later on we saw a family get separated by the doors shutting and the father was all, “I’ll wait for you!” OMG we laughed so hard.
The plane ride from Dallas to Vegas had BAD turbulence and at one point it felt like the engine shut off and then the plane made a huge drop. You could hear almost all the passengers gasp and scream. I gasped too, but then I laughed a lot afterward. Kristi was nervous about it because we had seen some red and yellow lights flashing on the wing right before the engine shut off and the plane dropped. And wouldn’t you know it, the pilot did not say anything about it, they just kept on about their business like nothing had happened.
It was crazy hot in Vegas. I don’t care what people say about it being a dry heat, when it’s 110 degrees at 10pm, it doesn’t matter if it’s dry or humid, it’s still unbearable… especially when you are standing in a line a mile long at the airport waiting for a cab and the heat is compounded by the exhaust fumes and 100 people in line smoking like chimneys. I think we lost a few years off our lives in that line.
Smoking is the one thing that shocked us the most about Vegas. It’s so bizarre to see people smoking indoors, and not just at restaurants, but in shops, in hallways, in lobbies, in restrooms, everywhere. It’s disgusting! You couldn’t get away from the smoke, and most smokers are just downright inconsiderate about it. They will blow smoke right up in your face as if it’s a gift of oxygen and you’re suffocating.
It just stuns me that smoke is scientifically proven toxic substance that kills, and yet people can blow it in your face with no recourse, yet if I maced someone for blowing smoke in my face I would probably go to jail or get ticketed… and mace is a natural non-toxic substance. Granted mace is definitely a major irritant, but it doesn’t have life long health risks. SHOCKING.
Anyways… we got in so late on Friday that we just went to our room and went to bed. We were exhausted from traveling all day. This was the view from our room, it’s not that great, but the mountains were beautiful.
Saturday we got so much accomplished that I’m sure it’s a world record for Vegas. We got up early and had a delicious buffet and stuffed ourselves stupid. We went over to Bally’s (we were staying at the Bellagio) to get a shuttle for our mini city tour. The tour was kind of lame, but yet fun and informative. We learned a lot about Vegas and it’s history and got to see a lot of the city, outside of the strip. So I can honestly say Vegas is a dirty gross run-down city. Outside of the strip, the city is just nasty. You would never guess that the city just turned 100 last year, because the buildings are so run-down and out of shape. It’s SAD.
The bus driver was telling us about the laws in the city and how we should be mindful of the crosswalks and the no-walk signs. He said that the law does not do much to drivers that hit people when they are walking illegally. He told us about this one lady that lost control of her car (was on medication) and killed four people at a bus stop; she only got a citation. He said if you are on the crosswalk and the light changes to green, car drivers can hit you and they may not even get a citation. Pedestrians ONLY have the right of way when the walk sign is up. I was joking about how the sign should be changed from “don’t walk” to “You better run!”
We took a tour of the Ethel M Chocolate Factory (the M stands for Mars, of Mars Candies). Sadly, the factory wasn’t operating because it was Saturday, but we still got to see the machines and get some free samples, and even buy some chocolate. They had a nice cactus garden in front of the museum and we did a little tour of that. Being from Texas, we were not that impressed with seeing cacti. However, this cactus reminded me of Evita… you know, on the balcony with her hands up.
Our next stop was the Elvis-O-Rama museum, which was not nearly as good as I had hoped. I was really looking forward to lots of gaudy outfits and bad jewelry, of which there was not much. They also would not let you take any pictures inside the museum. We did get to watch a small performance from an Elvis impersonator and there were two “stars” there from one of his movies, and they were selling autographs. The gift shop there totally sucked though… yet I still managed to buy a few things and the cashier liked me, so she gave me a free teddy bear. Woot woot!
We stopped at the Venetian next and we started our goal; we agreed to play at least one slot in every casino. You see, Kristi and I are not gamblers and don’t enjoy throwing our money away, but since it was Vegas, we decided to do a little of it. I was lucky and tripled or quadrupled my money nearly every time I played. Kristi was pretty lucky too, but not as lucky as me. Of course I only played $5 max at a time. We generally stayed at the 25cent slots, and we thought we were high rollers when we hit the $1 slots! The amounts I won were enough to buy food, cab rides, and presents.
Staying at the Bellagio totally corrupted us for the other hotels, as none of them compare. We’d go into other hotels and complain about the manual toilets, the ugly decor, the questionable clientel, and the services. Being in Bally’s was like being in the ghetto, we were sure we were going to get shanked in there. The only hotel that compared to ours was the Venetian, it was beautiful and classy. I don’t know why I took this picture, but here it is anyway. It’s the ceiling in one of the areas of the Venetian.
At the Venetian we went to Madame Tussads Wax Factory, and took a bunch of pictures. They didn’t have a bunch of celebs, and it was kind of lame, but being able to take pics and use props was super fun and we had a great time, definitely worth our money. I”ll never get the chance to slap the real J.Lo, but at least I got a pic of me slapping the wax one. Also, I got to pose with my twin… Tim McGraw. This lady in line behind me said, “OMG you two could be brothers!” I don’t like Ryan Seacrest, in fact I despise him, but I could not resist sitting on his lap and kissing him… cuz he’s a big homo. I kissed Elvis to make my friend Xoch jealous, she loves him. Of course, my lips never touched either of them… gross… no telling how many nasty people have touched them.
We went back to the hotel, changed, and got ready for dinner with Brenna and her family. We had dinner at this Asian restaurant in the Bellagio, Noodles. OMG, the waitress was such a witch. Kristi and I were in a rush because we had tickets to Cirque du Soliel and had to be in our seats by 7:15, and dinner started at 6. Of course everyone was late and we didn’t start ordering until 6:30. So Kristi asked the waitress if we could order separately, and before everyone else, so that we could get out faster, that just pissed her off. I had ordered a Makers and Coke right before Kristi talked to her, but I forgot if I had ordered it or not, so I asked the waitress when Kristi was finished.
Me: Did you get my Makers and Coke order?”
Her: Yes I get you order. You see, it right here. (points to her pad) I no hab time to get it yet, because SHE WANNA EAT!”
SNAP!
Then she asked Leslie if she wanted bottle water or tap, and Leslie said tap, and the Witch looked at her like she just crawled out from under a rock. She was giving us all grief. Brenna’s dad, Mike, was trying to order and the Witch told him “Just point to some-ting!” I said, “Oh she is about to get cut! I’m going to stab her with my chopsticks and I’m not even going to smooth off the splinters first.” I know she heard me because she was standing right next to me. It was funny though. Kristi and I kept yelling “She wanna eat!” at various times during the rest of our trip.
We had just barely enough time to eat and rush over to see “O”, luckily it was in the same hotel and just around the corner from the restaurant. The show was great and we had the best seats. They were far enough up that we could see the entire stage without straining, and close enough that we weren’t staring at ant sized people. Also, we were in basically our own balcony, there was nobody in front of us, or behind us, AND I had the handicap seat that was detached from the floor and on wheels. SCORE! So I got to wheel around and stretch out.
After the show we went did some walking around in our hotel. I took a picture of the gorgeous glass flowers on the ceiling in the lobby. It stretched almost the entire length of the lobby, and it was crazy beautiful. I only got a small portion in this pic. Each flower was bigger about the size of my torso or larger.
They had a botanical garden right off from the lobby, it was kind of cool. Mostly I was impressed with these weird water fountains that shot over the trails. You can just barely see them in this pic. You had to walk under them to look around.
We went over to the John Philippe Patissere. They had this awesome chocolate fountain. You can’t see it, but the fountain actually goes up 14 feet above the ceiling and it holds literally TONS of chocolate. I also took a pic of this cake because I loved it so much. These people did the cake for Brenna’s wedding as well.
After we finished at our hotel we walked over to the Paris hotel to look around. Actually, I shouldn’t refer to these as hotels because they are all enormous resorts that take up more than a few city blocks. It’s an effort just to walk from one to the other. I love the Eiffel Tower and I have tons of them in my apartment, so obviously I was excited to see this giant replica. I’ll probably get one of these blown up and framed.
We came back to our hotel just in time to catch the water show out front. They have shows every 15 minutes and they are set to music, different kinds throughout the day. They actually call it water ballet, and it’s pretty spectacular to watch. The show we caught was set to Celine Dion’s “My Heart Will Go On”.
There were some religious freaks praying and giving sermons on the street corner by our hotel. We learned, from their sermons, that when you murder someone, you don’t just murder that person. You also murder their children, and their children’s children. Interesting, right? I guess they thought we were a crowd full of murderers. We also learned that adultery is a sin, and that you can commit adultery just by having lust in your heart. Ooops.
Sunday we spent some time at the pool in the morning. It was crazy hot. The day before had been hot, but there was lots of cloud cover, so it wasn’t so bad. Sunday, was clear skies and unbearable heat. I was dying. I actually got so hot that I had to go up to my room to get a hat to shade my head, and while I was up there I took a cold shower, and literally had to lay down because I started blacking out from heat exhaustion.
After the sunbathing, we went to our room and napped for a few hours… unfortunately we napped too long and I ended up making us late for the wedding. I should not have shaved my head, that was what made us late. Actually, we arrived on time, but literally RIGHT on time. We were running downs the halls of the hotel trying to get to the chapel 4pm.
The ceremony was very nice, short, and super sweet. Brenna looked gorgeous and she was glowing with happiness.
After the wedding we went to a reception in one of the suites. That was fun and the cake was delicious! Hands down, one of the best (if not the best) wedding cakes I have ever eaten, and definitely the most beautiful. Mark had a lot more relatives at the wedding that Brenna, so there were a bunch of people we didn’t know.
After the reception we went to the Hard Rock Hotel for dinner, it wasn’t anything planned, and very spontaneous. We didn’t have much choice because a lot of us were dressed casually, and our group was too big to spring on a place without a reservation. The group was all Brenna’s family and friends, well and of course her new husband, Mark. The Hard Rock Hotel was disgusting. The hotel itself was nice, but the people were nothing but drunks and sluts, disgusting drunks and sluts. There should be a dress code in the public parts of the hotels, and a swimsuit cover up should be required. It was like the MTV Beach House at spring break in there. Too much groping, kissing, and stumbling half naked ladies. I would never go back there. Our waiter was rude too.
When we got back to our hotel, we got locked out of our room for like the tenth time. Our room keys were like slots machines, sometimes they worked, but most of the time they didn’t. This picture is from one of the unfortunate times when neither of our room keys would work. We had to wait for security to let us in. I had just bought some mixed drinks in the lobby, so I started drinking, and I will have you all know that I was never drunk or even buzzed during this trip.
Monday was a long day, kind of like Saturday. It started off with breakfast at the Buffet at the Bellagio, then off to move our luggage over to the Monte Carlo because the Bellagio didn’t have a room for us for the extra night. From there we went and ran some personal errands for Kristi. We stopped by our hotel for a bit afterward, then went out shopping and sight seeing. We took a cab to the Fashion Mall so I could buy a Puma Ferrari hat for Francisco, but they didn’t have any in stock. Kristi bought a bunch of stuff from the A Pea in the Pod store. We walked back to the hotels and stopped at a few on the way, Treasure Island, Ceasars, and New York. We gambled a bit more and I finally got my first free drink! I was getting pretty bitter about it. I made Kristi order the same drink as me whenever the lady came around, because she doesn’t drink and then I wouldn’t have to wait for the waitress to make another trip by.
We stopped at the big mall at the Ceasar’s Palace and did some shopping and had dinner at Wolfgang Puck’s Asian Bistro, or whatever it was called. It was the best meal we had on our trip. We went into FAO Schwartz and Kristi asked me to play on the big piano so she could take some pictures. It’s not as easy as it looks in the movies. I think maybe too because the keys were worn out and not as sensitive as they should have been.
We got tired pretty early on Monday and we had an early flight on Tuesday, so we made it an early night. I think we got to bed around 11pm. We had a shuttle scheduled for 6am pickup, so we had to be up at 5. BLECH. Luckily we were the only ones on the shuttle, so we got there pretty quick. We also discovered that the route the shuttle took was half as long as the route the taxi took when we got picked up at the airport. We got ripped off!
Overall, I had a great time on the trip, bought some fun things (although not much because I had NO room in my luggage), and saw a lot of neat things. The wedding was great and it was so nice to see Kristi, Brenna, and the family again.
The traveling back home was much faster than going, a little too fast actually. I didn’t really have much time to get from my arrival gate in Dallas to my departure gate. I was the LAST person on the plane, and everyone was already sitting and settled. That was SO not cool, but at the same time I was glad to be moving fast to get home. I had way too much time between my flights on the way to Vegas.
Francisco picked me up at the airport yesterday at 3, and we only had two hours to spend together before he had to go to work. I spent the night unpacking, cleaning up, watering my plants, and being lazy. I’m ready for some more of the being lazy tonight.
