The Hinterlands.

It's 3 months until Vegas Xmas. Ugh.

This is always the toughest time of year for me. The stretch every year from August or September, whenever my last summer trip was, to December, is always rough. A numbing sort of rut sets in, especially now since I can't even go out on weekend in the City to take the no-fun edge off. It's 7:05a alarm every week day, trundle off to work, come home, stare at a computer screen, rinse, repeat. Then weekends post-COVID are sit around staring at the screen even more. And 3 more months of this til I can get my party on.

Getting the new car has added a little yay and a little boo to the proceedings. It's nice to look forward to the commute time again, but I suspect that will be short lived and there will be sacrifice financially for having gotten it. With some cutting back I should be OK, but next month when the bigger save amounts kick in there could be some "make a loaf of bread last a week" weeks. Maybe I can get a few "Sunday drives" in with the car to spice up the weekends and make it worth the expense. 

After a hellish two weeks trying to get all my prescriptions filled (I'm so DONE with Walgreens), that at least is handled until December. Won't have to deal with it again until the weeks leading into Vegas. I'm all set in terms of warm weather gear for the trip, too, got one new pullover already and have a sweater coming next week, and got some new undies too so no need for any pre-Vegas expense during the save, which starts this week. Won't have to shell out for a phone or iPad like last year and can't afford it now anyway. Slightly weird not to have a few K sitting chilling in the bank, I was flush for most of last year after leaving GL with the 401k cash out, and up until I went on the last trip I had around 5K sitting in there. Now back to making every buck count.

Vegas room sitch same. Primary is NoMad, CET a backup option, waiting to see if Cosmo comes through with a killer offer. V/P and Wynn out of the mix this time barring some amazing deal. Maybe can do one of those first trip next year after the tax refund where I won't need to do such a painful save pre-trip. I expect it'll be between Mlife and Caesars this time for "don't kill your Mlife CC balance" reasons while on the trip. Both can be had for under $500 all in. That's more my speed right now post-Corolla.

I've decided not to do a Vegas playlist this time, again. All of my ideas for lists are played out after 30+ trips and I'm just not feeling the 40-song limitation. I'm just going to take advantage of the iPad and pick and choose from my existing playlists on it to run music that fits my mood on the day while there. I did put all my Xmas/winter songs on a list in case I get nostalgic over that week.

So, not much left to report for a while, commence rut. It's probably going to be steady state unless there's a break in the room situation, so you may not hear from me for a bit. I'll check in as we get closer to Xmas Vegas...stay safe out there.