The Vegas Trip Part 1

Where to begin?

I had to work on Thursday.  It was quite possibly the longest day of my life.  I had a sick kid all night and just wasn't feeling like going to work.  But I did, only because I was late or had to take off at some point every single day last week.  I said goodbye to the kids, who really didn't give two shits that I was leaving.  The big kids were going to grandma's house where they would be spoiled all weekend.  The little one was going with an assortment of my friends since my mother flat out refused to keep him all weekend.  It was a good thing I made other arrangements for him anyway since she was in the hospital all week and finally discharged on Thursday morning.

I was supposed to leave work at 4:00 for our 5:25 departure.  I made it until 3:45 and I was running out the door.  Our flight was an hour late leaving due to deicing and all that good crap.  We had an uneventful flight until we came into Las Vegas airspace.  The President was flying in at exactly the same time, so we had to circle for about 20 minutes.  Damn President delaying my vacation!  We finally landed, grabbed our stuff and headed out to get a taxi.  In another 20 minutes we were being dropped off at the Monte Carlo.

At check-in I checked to see if they had any Spa rooms available.  They didn't.  Bummer....  VIP check-in was quick and I was told about my perks and all that good stuff.  Finally up in our room, the first thing I checked out was the view.  Below us was the pool complex and across from us was City Center and a direct view of their monorail system.  I decided I wanted mexican, so we went over to Gonzalez y Gonzalez at NYNY for dinner.  Kyle ingested 24 ounces of beer before we got over there and looked at me across the table and said "Babe, I'm drunk."  How fucking romantic.  We manage to make it through dinner without any incidents.  The rest of the evening we wander the strip and I use up my freeplay from the casino to jump start my gambling.  I managed to put over 1000 points on my players club card only costing me $60 in the long run.  I played until there was nothing left, then went over to play some blackjack.

What a mistake.  I've never seen a dealer pull so many 21's in my life.  Needless to say, I was out $200 in less than an hour.  Ok, I've been up for 24 hours now, time for some sleep.  Kyle was fast asleep in the room by the time I got up there, having had a rough trip back to Ohio.

Friday morning I'm woken up by my idiot friends text messaging me to see how things were going.  Apparently they forgot about the 3 hour time difference and thought texting me at 7am Vegas time would be a good idea.  We laid around for awhile and then decided to get up and head on down to Paris for their breakfast buffet.  While Kyle was in the shower, I get a phone call from daycare.  The little one needs to be picked up, he's got sores inside his mouth.  FUCK.  I knew none of my people would be able to go and get him, but I stalled for a way to get the kid out of there.  We went and had a great breakfast while I weighed my options on what to do with the kid.  Finally I called them back and told them JoJo would be able to pick him up, but not until 3:30.  That was the best I could do since she was the one keeping him over the weekend anyway.

After I got all that sorted out, we walked the strip ducking in and out of casinos all day checking things out.  Since Kyle had never been before, he was just amazed by everything taking pictures left and right.  We ended up down at Mandalay Bay and visited the Shark Reef.  I had been there before, but it was on his list of things to do, so we did it.  It was cool, just like the last time I was there.  Nothing much has changed with any of the exhibits since I first saw it when the hotel opened.

 

  

  

  

 

I wanted to get a nap before dinner, so around 3, we went back to the room and slept for a couple of hours.  By 5:00 we were up again and getting ready to go to Top of the World for dinner.  I noticed that I had several ugly looking bruises on my legs.  Eww that doesn't look nice.....  Once I got all pretty in my dress (uggggg) and boots, we were out the door and off to the Stratosphere.  I had never been down there before.  Well ok, I did get married over there in the ghetto, but I've never been to any casino north of the Wynn.  The place was packed!  We're screened by an unhappy security guard and we're on our way up.  My ears are popping and I'm uncomfortable.  Luckily we get up there relatively quickly.

 

  

 

We're quickly escorted to our table and our server was Lenny.  He lacked any sort of customer service skills, we'll just say that.  After taking 20 minutes to even ask us what we wanted to drink, we were ready to order.  I can say that I've had my first ever $15 Appletini.  It was worth every penny....  For dinner, we both picked Fillet and chose the three cheese gratin potatoes and creamed sweet potatoes.  I'm weird about steak.  The once or twice a year that I have it, it HAS to be medium-well.  I know, I know, that's too done to really enjoy it.  Call me weird, that's how it's gotta be.  In all the other restaurants I've been to, the fillet has been butterflied open to insure it's cooked properly.  Gallagher's at NYNY and Delmonico at the Venetian both did this and I had awesome steaks there.

Our food arrived and I'll just say I was disappointed.  Yes, it was a good portion (10oz.).  It was more than well done and tough though.  Kyle loved his of course, because it was still mooing and bleeding all over the plate.  The potato dishes were both just ok.  I didn't send my steak back, perhaps I should have, but at that point, I was starving since we hadn't eaten since breakfast.

All said and done, our bill came to over $150 for the two of us, with one alcoholic beverage.  Obviously we weren't paying for top notch food, but for the scenery.  The view of Vegas was incredible.  Our meal took an entire rotation of the restaurant and it was possibly one of the coolest things I've done out there.  After we were done eating we went up to the indoor observation deck.  One thing I'm wondering about.....  They're putting in a new attraction at the Stratosphere where it's basically a controlled free fall from the building.  I WOULD BE PISSED if I'm spending $150 on dinner to see some asshole drop off the side of the building.  It's above the restaurant, so I don't see how this wouldn't be irritating to people having dinner.  Anyway, we took lots of pictures up there and finally decided we were done and went back to the hotel to get out of our monkey clothes and head to Fremont Street.

After changing, we decided to walk off dinner back up the strip and just get a cab from one of the hotels up that way.  The crowds were ridiculous Friday night.  If there's a decline in tourism, I'm not sure when they're seeing it.  This past weekend was as busy as I saw it two years ago when I was there last.

We walk all the way up to Treasure Island and hop a cab downtown from there.  We get dropped off at the Plaza just as a light show is starting under the canopy.  It's Queen and everyone is having a GOOD (read that as drunk, dancing all over the place) time.  Kyle has never seen anything like it before and really enjoys it.  After the show is over, we spend some time walking around, hopping in and out of casinos and checking out all the little booths and street performers.  I try to make something happen at the blackjack table, but just couldn't get anything going for the life of me.  We stay for the next show, which is Kiss and around 11 we call it a night and head back to the Monte Carlo.  I was beat, having only gotten a couple of hours of sleep and a short nap and was sleeping by midnight.

At 4am I was woken up by my phone going off.  Damn it, I thought I set my Twitter account NOT to put updates through before 7am???  Oh yeah, that's 7am eastern time.... Fuck.  Ok then.  I roll over and sleep till about 8, when my phone starts going off because my retarded friends back home are texting me.  Being as I haven't been drinking due to lack of cocktail service all over the city, 8am isn't all that bad....  We get ready and head down to the Monte Carlo buffet to use some of the $350 in resort credit I have to spend.  I notice there are more bruises on my legs in the shower and show them to Kyle.  He notes that he DID NOT kick me to bruised hell in my sleep.  Ok then, but wow, good thing it's not shorts weather.....

To Be Continued....