Fin

We drove home from vegas. No more super high stakes low limit poker for this guy. Boo. The end.

The BEST Game in Vegas

The Sigma Derby horse racing game at MGM Grand is the best game in Vegas. Apparently there used to be a bunch of these, but this is the last remaining one for some horrible reason. It takes only quarters, you click the little yellow buttons to bet a quarter on whichever horse combination you think will finish the race in the top two, little fake horses run around the track while the game plays fake galloping noises, and if one of the combinations you bet on wins, you get paid out according to the odds posted around the inside edge in red numbers. It’s awesome!

Rapid Roulette at Sahara

Rapid Roulette is the automated touch-screen roulette game. It’s just like roulette only more rapid. The dealer still takes your cash, throws the ball into the wheel, and pays you when(if) you cash out, but your personal touch screen computer does everything in between. You make bets using the computer and it takes your money or pays you out. I threw that ‘if’ in there because I didn’t make it out with any of my $40. I hit a 17 early on to get 35x on my big $0.50 wager, but it went downhill from there.

Games for Idiots

Slot machines are really dumb. And apparently they don’t really need to hide it because the people who play them are even stupider. Here are some of my favorite slot machine names. The first, Enchanted Unicorn, I’ve already shown in a picture. It’s only really funny when dudes play it.

Any game with a “Shake Your Booty Bonus” must be fun:

Topless Vampires!

I learned a lot about vampires last night while attending the Bite show at The Stratosphere. For one, they are rock and roll enthusiasts. Styx, ACDC, and Guns and Roses headline a long list of 80’s and 90’s power rock groups enjoyed by our undead counterparts. Vampires also love to dance. This is predictable given the amount of rock music they listen to, but I was surprised to see they were such fans of ballet-inspired choreography. I was more expecting the blood orgy feeding frenzy rave dancing that the vampires do in the Blade movies. They must outgrow that phase?

Our fanged friends also have an interesting social hierarchy and history. The single Lord Vampire has a coven of “erotic rock angels” who were dying to replace his lost wife. Unfortunately for them, the Lord Vampire would just as well take a human for a bride and make her into a Vampire than pick a Vampire and make her into his wife. I thought he was courageous and open minded, but some people are less progressive than I. On the other hand, it’s possible the Lord Vampire only picked his human wife based on her more generously proportioned bosom. The thought wouldn’t have crossed my mind had I not noticed one other interesting tidbit about vampire culture: they really enjoy running around topless. Topless in thongs and occasional mesh stockings. If I had to venture a guess, I’d say they’re worried about dripping blood on their shirts when they chew necks and add to their minions. What is for sure is that vampires seem to have fairly modest chests, while the Lord Vampire’s human selection did not. I’m probably just being overly critical though; I’m sure he appreciated her personality, and wouldn’t you know it, despite coming out of the audience, she was also a great dancer! So fear not, all is well in vampire land, there is a new queen on the throne!

Roller Coaster Day!

The NY,NY roller coaster, The Manhattan Express, costs $14 for a single ride and $25 for an all day pass, so yesterday was our twice-delayed roller coaster day. It wasn’t open the previous two days due to Vegas’s crazy winds. Nine rides, two bruised shoulders, a heavily jostled brain, and a good bit of motion sickness later, I think I’ve gotten my roller coaster fill for the trip. Despite bouncing on the tracks and violently throwing you around in your seat, the roller coaster was excellent. We rode it five times during the day and came back for another four rides at night. The giant, glowing green MGM Grand building, the Luxor spotlight, and the thousands of other bright lights on The Strip made riding at night particularly enjoyable.

Red Rock It!

If to drive a few miles from Vegas toward the west, in the direction directly opposite from the Hoover Dam, you come to a bunch of big rocks. Some of them happen to be red, so the powers that be created the Red Rocks Canyon National Conservation Area. We went there last Monday. It’s pretty, but I prefer landscapes with green plants and water. Also, despite the visitors center getting my hopes up, I didn’t see a single desert tortoise. Or a rattlesnake. The park consists of a thirteen mile scenic drive loop, many places to park to take in the more significant views, and loads of foot paths. Anand and I were feeling extra adventurous, so we set out on a trail that our map estimated to take an hour. We got maybe halfway through before deciding that buffets and poker haven’t put us in proper hiking shape. Besides, dry crusty-looking shrubs don’t do it for me, and that’s pretty much all there is as far as wildlife goes. Here are a few more pictures:

The Fremont Street Experience

Thursday night we finally went to check out old downtown Vegas. I didn’t know what was supposed to be downtown and kinda just suspected a few old-timey casinos scattered in the midst of lots of office buildings. Yeah, not quite, and I now i feel bad about not taking any of our Vegas visitors to Fremont Street because it was awesome. Fremont Street is worlds more compact than The Strip and has been closed off to traffic since 1994, so it’s a much more festive atmosphere. We got there just before the 9PM light show, in time to buy a couple football beers, one of the best purchases I’ve ever made.

Holy Sh*t, It’s a Spiral Escalator!

How cool is that? This is in the Forum Shops of Caesar’s Palace, and I’ve ridden this thing up and down like eight times for no better reason than that I think it’s wonderful. The Forum Shops is basically a high-end mall with faux Roman structures all over the place. Did you know that the spiral escalator was developed under emperor Septimius Severus in 194AD? It’s true; look it up. The center of the mall has a fantastic fountain with giant horse sculptures and some dude standing in the middle, although my curiosity didn’t take me so far as to figure out who he was. The most exciting store, head and shoulders above the boring designers I’ve never heard of and wouldn’t be able to afford anyway, is the FAO Schwartz toy store. It’s three stories high, has enormous stuffed animals including rhinos, a life-size cow, and a $4500 or so dragon, and has a forty foot tall Trojan Horse in its entrance that you can walk into.

My New Favorite Vegas Pastime

You know that Photo Hunt touch-screen game they have at bars? Yeah, it’s great. Now imagine if bartenders for some reason would give you free drinks while you played. We would already have a solid contender for best bar ever, but let’s also say that the game cost a nickel instead of a quarter and that you don’t have to worry about any of that silly running out of time nonsense. You could sit and chat and play the game, nickel by nickel, at your leisure, while drinking for free. These are all wonderful things, but here’s the kicker! What if the game didn’t just take your nickels but gave you some back if you did well? Potentially gave you lots back. Bliss!

Well, there’s no casino Photo Hunt as far as I know, but there is nickel video poker and it’s wonderful! I played a few times this week since Shayerah was in town and didn’t have the experience, bankroll, or desire to play live poker in the card rooms.

My most horrible video poker session to date has cost me a whopping $1.50 over an hour or so, which is outstandingly fantastic when you consider that that last Corona I had in a restaurant here was $7. Ouch! My best hand yet was four 10s, but I’m on a mission for that elusive royal flush. Apart from video poker in the casinos, slot machines are agonizingly dull and mindless; I don’t know how all these blue-haired ladies sit there by their walkers, playing for hours. Then there’s blackjack. I played my first (and probably last) blackjack of the trip yesterday at Tropicana. The cheapest game you can find on The Strip is $5 minimum bets, and I came away with what amounted to a $41 Corona. What a steal! I’m sticking to nickel video poker from here on out, and once I hit that royal flush and score a cool twelve dollars and fifty cents, I’ll fly you all out to join me!