Your Daily Photo (Big Stripper is Big Edition)

Stay classy, Vegas...

(taken at the Miracle Mile Shops, in Las Vegas)

Your Daily Photo (Mmmmm, Chocolate Edition)

The photo taken at the Jean Philippe Patisserie found at the Bellagio Resort in the Las Vegas.

(sorry for the Manolo-speak, can't help myself sometimes, if the model pictured in today's post at shoeblogs were to get within sniffing distance of the confection pictured above, I think she might the faint)

Also home to the world's largest chocolate fountain (not pictured, doesn't really photograph well, but it's impressive in person).

Split a nutella crepe after dinner (at Koi, well executed Japanese food, not insanely expensive) and a show (Peepshow, featuring Holly Madison, entertainingly cheesy/sexy) Tuesday night. It was far more delicious than you'd ever have a right to expect for a nutella based dessert.

Your Daily Photo (Does a Pumpkin Have to Be Large to Be Great, Charlie Brown? Edition)

Just a couple hundred pounds worth of pumpkin for your Friday night perusal.

(shot Tuesday at the Bellagio in Las Vegas)

LOL Obama, Daily 15 February 2010

(no comment)

Your Daily Photo (Come to Tao, Where You Can Get a Massage with "Release" Along with Your Sushi Edition)

Tao Las Vegas at the Venetian, it's an Asian bistro, a nightclub, and a beach, and apparently also a place where you can find a 'happy ending'.

Hopefully, the 'happy ending' available at Tao goes better than what that poor fella went through.

LOL Obama, Daily 03 February 2010

Context, here.

I Am a Time Lapsing Fool, Baker to Vegas Edition

Finally uploaded my Baker to Vegas trip, via the backdoor, timelapsed. Taken the Sunday before Memorial Day.

BLOGTOBER 2009: I May Have to Stay at a Wynn Property This BLOGTOBER...

Wow, preach it Steve, preach it baby.

(via Drudge)

Now, it's just a matter of when, and which Wynn property to book.

The newer Encore, or its near twin Wynn, Las Vegas?

Decisions, decisions

(you'd make my choice a lot easier if you'd be really generous in my tip jar)

(what? I don't have a tip jar, dammit, I'll accept checks made out to "cash")

And speaking of Steve "No not Hotel Steve, I'm the Real Steve" Wynn, Hotel Steve Wynn would never have a diary entry like this:

I'm sitting on the couch at home in New York and watching the Vikings against the Packers. Linda is a few feet away, sewing and cheering for Brett Favre. That alone is disorienting. It's also disorienting that she's sitting to my right. In the van she was always on my left. This is how I know I'm no longer on tour, not to mention the fact that Taqueria Del Fonda just delivered a big order of chilate (spicy chicken soup). That never happened in the van.

I remain jealous of a rockin' burgundy crushed velvet smoking jacket he used to wear on stage throughout the 80s and 90s (and later, possibly, I haven't seen him in concert or around town since then, used to see him alot back in the day, and he would often have on that awesome smoking jacket of which I could never find an equal for myself).

Your Daily Photo (You Really Can't Call It a Successful Night in Vegas Until Police Get Involved Edition)

I spent more time doing stuff rather than taking pictures while in Vegas. One of the places I visited was The Atomic Testing Museum. No pictures were allowed inside, and the outside is unimpressive, so no snaps there.

Fun place, well designed exhibitions, and definitely pro-nuclear weaponry. None of this namby pamby 99 Luftballons crap. Our arsenal saved (and continues to save) the world from certain nastiness. You can bet that had the Germans or Japanese had the industrial might to have developed nuclear weaponry before we did, they'd have used them, and if we hadn't been able to threaten the Soviets with annihilation, they'd have been far more belligerent during the Cold War.

Your Daily Photo (Don't Let Althouse See This Picture Edition)

Players in shorts, fine, they're athletes, but the coaches?

Not a good look.

(but for the record, I wore shorts, too, it was 106 in Las Vegas yesterday, so comfort ruled, fashioned suffered)

Didn't take any of the usual tourist-y shots of the Strip last night, didn't feel like lugging around my camera, maybe tomorrow after hours and hours of watching basketball.

Turns out shooting video is a no-no during the Summer League (at least with a good camera), I got busted by one of the event-staff, she told me I could snap stills, but no video, guess they don't want the teams pulling a New England Patriots type move. I was isolating a specific player while shooting (which is why I guess that she could tell I running video rather than stills), which was more just for practice keeping the camera somewhat steady and fluid.

I wasn't going to post any of the video on YouTube, but since I was told I wasn't even supposed to capture the footage, I feel I almost have to, even if just to see if I get a take down notice for doing so.

Your Daily Photo (Vegas, and I'm Not the Only One Taking Snaps Edition)

The Palms pool, as seem from my room this afternoon.

(and before you complain about this no being in focus, it is through a window, and from the eighteenth floor)

Had an easy drive, and decided to catch part of the action at the NBA Summer League today as well since I got in early. It was fun, for the most part, Memphis beat OKC in a rout, but I liked the way the Thunder played, better. Livingston looked fluid on the floor, so he may really be back from that devastating knee injury, and for Memphis, Thabeet wasn't much of a defensive presence, even against lesser competition. Definitely didn't look like a #2 overall pick. Also, he's listed at 267 in the program, but my guess is he's 20-30 pounds lighter than that, he's going to get pushed around by the real centers (and even some forwards) in the NBA unless he finds a way to improve both his bulk and footwork (which is hard to do both, for bigs usually one comes at the expense of the other). Earlier, caught just the first half of New Orleans v San Antonio, but saw enough to know that George Hill is for real, and Darren Collison is NBA ready on offense, but defensively he needs work, which is surprising given that he was known for his defense at UCLA. Also, DeJuan Blair was a steal for San Antonio, how the hell did he slip to #37? Only saw the first half of the Cleveland v Milwaukee contest, would have stayed, but other than Brandon Jennings, nobody on the floor was that interesting, and it seemed as if the refs decided they should be the stars of that contest. No flow, the refs were calling everything, and if these Summer League games aren't run like the best pick-up games you've ever scene, then there's not really much reason to watch.

Your Daily Photo (Where I Copy Woot! and Give You a Tuesday Twofer Edition)

The view from my ninth floor suite on the Vegas Strip, where I spent last night...


The view of my suite at Bally's, cause that's how I roll. In theory, an in room tub is great. In practice, equals one stubbed toe, and one banged shin against that hard, cold marble.

Didn't plan on staying overnight, certainly wouldn't have booked a suite with a 'love tub' going to Vegas by myself, but decided driving to Vegas and back after a few hikes in the desert on one of the worst nights for drunken drivers was probably a bad idea.

Not a good sign for Vegas that I could book a room on the strip (I booked a cheaper room, they bumped me up to a suite) at the last minute on a big holiday weekend.

I regret not having gone to Edwards AFB to catch the probable last shuttle landing on the west coast. I even set an alarm for 5:30AM local time to listen to mission control, and they still seemed determined to land in Florida, didn't want to drive for two and a half hours for something that didn't seem likely to happen, so I went back to sleep and got a few extra hours of shut-eye before I took off for Vegas. I took a detour after hitting Baker, heading towards Death Valley and then up to Pahrump. Got pulled over by the CHP just before the Nevada border, but instead of writing me up for speeding (warning only), the officer was more interested in chatting me up about my camera, so buying my Nikon D5000 has already paid dividends.

And if you are paying attention to the titles of these posts, you'll notice that in this one there's a reference to Woot!'s Tuesday Twofer deals. Mostly they're crappy things that they have to sell two of at ridiculous prices to get rid of, and this Tuesday's deal is no different.

Maybe I Should Cut Back on the Work Outs . . .

"The guy was healthy as an ox," Lightman said. "I spoke to Steve Wynn several times this morning and both of us were shocked. I was with Danny the day before yesterday. Healthy as an ox. I mean, all he ate was egg whites and spinach and worked out religiously."

From the AFP (via Drudge) article on the surprising death of impressionist Danny Gans at the age of 52.

Sometimes It Snows in April (In Las Freakin' Vegas Edition!)

Prince was right, it does snow in April sometimes, even in the mountains above Las Vegas.

And above's a really well done cover of the song by Zabeth Dkos.

I Call Shennanigans!

A snooty Brit snootily snoots about her snooty disdain for the city of Las Vegas. She's entitled to her opinion, and she admits to being anhedonic right there in the article:

When I told my friends I was going to Las Vegas naturally their first question was: why? Most people go there to have fun. And since I don’t have fun, it didn’t make sense. If you don’t drink, gamble, or swing on a pole, Las Vegas is an incongruous destination.

Clearly any vacation would just be another source of misery, but one to Vegas was extra trying for this poor soul. But that's not why I call shennanigans, this bit here:

All I wanted was to get upstairs to the room. But when I got there, all I wanted was to open a window – something I quickly discovered isn’t possible in Las Vegas. I called down to ask why my window wouldn’t open and was informed that too many people end up jumping after they’ve lost all their money.

First, it's not because of suicide that they'd not have openable windows, it's climate control, you are in the middle of a freakin' desert you git, if they had windows that opened, tourists like you would set their room AC to 20°C with the windows open on a 40°C day. I've stayed at older hotels with outdoor patios (The Sahara for one) even on upper levels. I bet most new hotels in places like Phoenix or Dubai also don't have windows you can fling upon. Doesn't she care about the environment? She wants to drive up the Mandalay Bay's energy usage, just so she can have access to a natural breeze. If that was so important to her, the Motel 6 on Tropicana has windows you can open, maybe she should have booked a room there, then she really could have had something to be really snooty about (the rooms aren't horrible there, just the usual slightly rundown Motel 6 quality you come to love and expect).

I seriously doubt that any staff member answering the phone at a resort style hotel like Mandalay Bay would give an answer to the question she posed that touched on losing money gaming, or suicide. Staff are trained never to mention losing, and to always wish you good luck, and frown in a commiserating but reassuring manner if you mention a losing streak you are on. These people are good at what they do, they wouldn't baldly state something like that (at least they shouldn't). Makes a great anecdote, but I suspect it's a baldface lie.

And Ariel dear, next time you come to Vegas, I'm pretty sure the Deluxe Luv Tub Rooms at the Imperial Palace have windows you can open, bring me along, and I'll cure you of your anhedonia (I like a challenge . . ., and those Luv Tubs).

(If I can manage to have fun in Vegas when I broke my leg on they way there, spending half a day in the emergency waiting room, and dealing with a temporary cast, I think you should be able to have a bit of fun getting pampered at a pretty decent resort like Mandalay Bay)

The Thing About Las Vegas, NV . . .

Las Vegas, ersatz, kitschy, and ridiculous, that's what that place is. And if you hate Las Vegas, then you hate the United States of America, free market capitalism, the rest of the free world, and humanity in general.

I'm pretty sure Lileks loves all those things, and Vegas, too.

(which reminds me, been awhile since I've been, might be a roadtrip with illustrations in my future)