It's Not A Bender, It's A Lifestyle.

  A bit financially fucked going into August. I was able to put the down payment on the trip away, $1500, yesterday. However, with buying the plane ticket on the CC in July and having to buy a new chair and dispose of my old broken one, I now have something of a heavy month to pay back the CC and not run any interest. I may not be able to put dollar one away for SeptemberVegas in August, leaving me with 3 checks to come up with the last $3K I need to make the cash save number. I've been in this position before, SO many times. Back in the "still digging out of financial hell and not making that much money" phase of my life, say around 2011-2015, I regularly had to budget the fuck out of my life to make the Vegas save. Denying myself weekends out, skrimping on food, sticking to a strict budget. It's been a while, and I'm out of practice, but I may need to adopt a modified skrimp the next two months. There are ways I could cheat. I could float some of the CC debt and...

  I use what I call the "algorithm" to decide where to stay in Vegas. The algorithm consists of several factors, more or less evenly weighted. Resort:  Do I want to stay in this place from an amenity and poshness standpoint. Is there enough food/bev/VP onsite to make this the place I want to start and end my day every day. Do I like the vibe? Have I stayed here in the past and enjoyed myself? Am I going to have "fun" here over the course of 5 days, relatively speaking?  Room: Standard room for full comp or suite for $300/night? Strip view for $50 more a night? Is this an "occasion" trip like a birthday, and therefore I want to go baller, or just a run of the mill June trip where I can save some $$ on the room. Also, is this a resort or room I want to tick off my "been there" list? Location: Where on the strip is this, relative to dead center strip, i.e. Bellagio. Am I going to have to cab or walk a lot to get here on a daily basis, and what...

  SeptemberVegas. Happening. Decided to make this a 4 trip year. Going to wrap a few PTO days around a weekend and fit in a 5-night, 4-day semi-quickie at the end of September. I'll fly in after the day of work on a Thursday then have 4 full days in town. As of now I have a bog standard room at MGM Grand booked for around $100 all in, but that may change as offers and time roll in/on. $120 FP, $100 RC. So MGM is giving me $120 to come to Vegas again. FB is giving me 2 nights and no resort fees but that's still $500 all in, we'll see what I can coax out of RW when those offers come in. I'll have nailed down MGM Gold a couple weeks from now, so I can be a free agent if I want. As always it'll be hard to beat the dirt cheap MGM rates, and for fuck's sake I've earned them, but it's nice to have a little flexibility the rest of the year if I want it. Thought about driving but with no cool down days before going back to work I thought better of it. A 9 hour dr...

Yep. Vegas. Flights: Fine, no issues. About a half hour delay on the in, 10 mins on the out. Room: Cosmo Terrace Studio, Boulevard, 69th floor, Aria view. Good room, clean, good view, little loud at night. Tons of emergency vehicles all the time. Also was about a half hour late getting into it on the Sunday. But otherwise no issues. Resort: I love the 'Mo, always have always will. Spent a ton of time in there at the start and end of days, never let me down. Spent a lot of time and money at Vesper. Strip: Slow week, and didn't see much of it. Mostly shuttled between Cosmo and FB. Got to Rematch a couple times, a couple Fuels, RW for about an hour, but no new ground covered really. Easy to get around, started getting busier on the 2nd for the holiday WE. Drinking: I don't want to talk about it. Food: Pretty good, had the steak at Jean Georges, the Conos at Jaleo, and made it down for the Bolognese at Carama, all fantastic. Got a couple lunches in there too so overall ate OK, ...

And so it (nearly) begins. Tomorrow is Las Vegas. Really happy I'm doing the vacation the way I am. The trips where I leave and come back mid-week are dildos. You get off of work and head straight to the airport, then on the come back you're right back to work the next day after 5 days of punishment. This way I have a night and a half to relax, clear my mind, and have time to prep for the trip, then when I'm back next Friday, I have 2 days to recover. Civilized. I checked into the flight this morning. Despite buying a row 2 seat, I still had to pay another $16 for priority boarding. Southwest you fucking whores. Whatever, sunk cost at this point, whatever gets me in and out of the airport as expeditiously as possible is worth it.  Woke up this morning and immediately started a flurry of activity, got the dopp kit set up, got all my drugs, legal and otherwise, collected, charging all the electronics, etc. The bag is 90% packed, I'm checked into the Cosmo and ...

T-minus two weeks and change. Still locked down, there won't be any itinerary changes now. I had Carama on the books for Monday, with their unspeakably good Bolognese, but decided that might be a stretch to be that far away from home base (center strip), so I re-added Jean George at Aria instead. It's stumbling distance from the room, the filet is always solid, and that miso steak sauce is top tier. I plan to be at MB for Xmas so the Bolognese will have to wait until then, unless I make it down there. Which I might! Pulled another $1200 out of the bank today for the cash spend fund, only $500 left to pull to make the number. One check left so no problem. Will be at the full $5K plus will probably have a couple hundy extra for walking around money. I get another check literally on the day I come back, so no issues with any bill payment or carrying of debt. Coming back with a few grand, as I did in April, makes the following Vegas save much more relaxed. Been playing 30 or so han...

  I've done plan posts since I started this thing, for pretty much every trip. I don't really plan much on these trips, anymore. This may be the last plan post, unless or until I do some actual planning for a Vegas trip. Which I don't. The bulk of my planning now usually consists of a couple food reservations, so that I'm more or less forced to eat. I have seen pretty much all the shows I want to see, and I generally don't leave the strip to GO anywhere, so these posts have become low quality, really.  So: I get there around 11:30a on a Sunday. I have reservations Mon-Tue-Wed at Jean Georges, Jaleo and Zuma. They will all be very good. I have a no plans day at the start of the trip, and a no plans day at the end of the trip, as is my wont. I will drink heavily, eat (mostly) well and gamble badly for 5 days. It will be hot, as it will be Las Vegas in June/July. Then I will leave on Friday, if I have a pulse. Done! Anything weird that comes up will be covered in the p...

  Oh yes, it's June. It's a Vegas month. Freebies and discounts, as we do. -5 nights at Cosmopolitan in a Terrace Studio King, 3 nights comped, $108 all in, would be $1233 on rack rate, savings of $1125. -$120 Freeplay from booking package, $282 Slot Dollars from CC, value $402. Potential value: trillions.  -$50 RC from the booking package, $33 in Rewards Points, $83 in value. So $1610 of pre-trip value this time. Not remotely an all-timer, and that was never going to be the case since this is a quick turnaround trip. Won't have much in the way of RC. Still tidy though, especially on the room at Cosmo which is a nice one. Have stayed in it several times, plenty of space for a single boy and it's always nice to have a terrace in the summer. Coming back to your room at 3a, altered, sitting on your terrace in 90 degree weather while eating an ice cream bar is next level Vegas. So a little over 3 weeks now from yet another Vegas, looking good, feeling good. Hell, I may even...

Put JuneVegas to bed today. Got a little bump on Freeplay in my June offers from my April spend, so I rebooked the same room at Cosmo to get the added value. +$40 in FP above the old offer, same RC, about $20 out of pocket more to book so I come out $20 ahead from rebooking, with no penalty on room qual or resort. I'm still getting paid to come to Vegas, at least room-wise. Still the Terrace Studio King, probably with an Aria view but whatev. I already have the pictures from the other side. So that's it. Great resort, it's a plus room, and perfect placement on center strip to be able to branch out and have a live trip. Good flight and transportation package set, some good food reservations in the queue, and it should be a nice, mellow week on strip, perhaps until the day I leave, when the July 4th-ers start slinking in. I'll be happy to turn it over to them. World Cup round of 32 will be on all week while I'm there, I don't expect it to impact me much but it mig...

  Threw a "why not" reservation on for Xmas. 6 nights at W Las Vegas, Dec. 22nd - 28th. 4 nights comped, $120/$100 booking package, all in cost $120. Strip View King Suite. I figured what the hell, might as well get something on the books, if my offers go up after June I can rebook with no penalty, and if my offers go down, I'm locked into a great resort and a good package. As previously chronicled, I love the Mandalay Bay complex and it's always a good time to stay there over Xmas week. Have done it a couple times now, I like the remoteness of the resort on the strip that week for some reason, it's like a retreat to come back to at the end of the day. TheHotel/Delano/W (make up your fucking mind) rooms are nice enough, a step up from a standard room anywhere else in the MGM pantheon. I will have MGM Gold locked in well before even hitting ground in December, so I may very well book somewhere else if I get a tasty offer. Maybe FB or RW, since those are the only 2...

  June is coming up fast.  Just over a month now. It'll be a skinnier trip, no crazy upgrade like last time, no flouncing around with an Emerald suite, and no big spending in general. I'll be having JUST the number on per-day cash spend budget. And right now, I have a good terrace room at Cosmo locked in for a little over $120 all in, no reason to dick with that unless my offers go up in May or June, pretty significantly ( UPDATE : they didn't, at least in May). 3/$120/$50 and just over a hundy all in out of pocket for my favorite resort and a non-standard room with a terrace (even if it's just looking at the ass end of Aria) is nails. I like being paid to stay in a top-tier resort in Vegas. This will be, while skinnier, a pretty relaxed trip money-wise. If I do come back with some pay it forward funds and I haven't wrecked the CC, then a late summer/early fall trip may be doable. If not, and my ass is handed to me, I can just shrivel up into a ball and financially...

Going big air for JuneVegas. Decided against doing a questionable road trip over 4th of July week, and booked a fairly posh flight/parking package instead. Will be going in with a pretty much ideal arrival time of about 11:30a, 2nd row aisle seat on Southwest. The out leaves at 12:20p, so no early fly out day wake up, 3rd row aisle seat. I'll have early group boarding so can get on/off in a jiffy. Will be in the very posh Harvey Milk terminal too so may be able to use Priority Pass on the Sunday. $350, so ouch, but I was just really worried about driving on a holiday weekend, especially on the trip back.  Instead, the car will be parked in International Garage 1 at SFO, about a 10 minute walk from the gates. $220, also ouch, but it's again me paying to minimize inconvenience. I could park in an uncovered offsite lot for a lot less, but that's either a wait for a shuttle or an Uber to and from the airport to parking. I just want to get in and out of the airport as quickly as...

  Points came in from AprilVegas. It's a LOT. Gained over 16K tier points, now up over 50K...after only one Vegas trip this year. I only need 75K to retain Gold. I may get there on JuneVegas. Crazy. Also piled up some very good Slot Dollars as well, over $150, now close to $200. Look, the MGM Rewards CC is not for everyone, it's got a very specific band of value to it, but damn if I'm not in the band. Platinum level still a pipe dream, would have to get to 200K points which, nah. But I won't have much to play for the rest of the year at MGM spots, even if I didn't take a trip the rest of the year I'll get to Gold just from the monthly CC spend. Which means I'll be able to range a bit on the last 2 (3?) trips of the year. I can plug more into FB or RW to see if any comped nights come out of that. Might have to work too hard to get into FB's good graces but RW's system is so retarded they may pay me. We'll be able to find out. There's no other ...

  Back to the hobbit hole from AprilVegas. High/lowlights. Flights: The in was fine, on time despite a bit of a tarmac hold and got me on the ground a little after 1p. The out was a shitshow. Fucking incoming landing delays kept pushing the flight back time and again. Didn't finally get off the ground, for a 1:30p flight, until after 5:30p. Nightmare. I hate waiting for anything, even more so waiting in a packed airport on flyout day when I'm tired and hung over. Not United's fault, but just bad. Rooms/Resort: MGM Grand, the Emerald suite was a banger all around. Huge room, 3 bathrooms, giant TV's, bar, just amazing. Best room I've ever had in Vegas, not close. No view really but didn't care. Totally quiet and no housekeeping issues. Paying a grand was worth it in this case. Won't do it on every trip but it made it a better one. The Grand itself was fine, busy for the WWE as expected. Didn't really affect me much, usually was just there for the start and...

  I'm a silly bitch. I just upgraded to an Emerald One Bedroom Suite at the Grand for this week. Over 1300 sq ft. One big bedroom, a guest bathroom and a HUGEnormous master bath, wet bar, fridge, shuffle ball table (!), black marble everywhere, big lounge area with a 65". Three sets of windows on a high-ish floor, hopefully with a strip view. Crazy. It would be a $4600 suite for the 5 nights if I wasn't in Rewards. I'm getting it for $945 for the week for me, so a stupid discount. It might be the baller-est suite I've ever had in Vegas. I SO don't need it, but at this point I honestly don't know how many more birthday month trips I'll have to Vegas, or anywhere, for that matter. I'm certainly not getting any younger or healthier. Let's go big while I can, is what I'm thinking. I have a little extra cash in the bank RN, so fuck it. The CC will take a post-trip hit but I've already paid it down by $500 today after booking and I'll jus...

  Getting dangerously close to AprilVegas. Pulled the sacrificial gambling fund out of the bank today. I'll be taking $5500. $1K for each full day and a little "walking around" money for the airport and cab and stuff Wednesday. Still have all bills covered and am paying down the CC somewhat on this check so I'm not leaving myself destitute as I have done at times in the past. The 401K loan was not ideal, but hopefully I can pay some of it forward to a summer trip if the VP doesn't murder me. The fund is meant to be spent, but again, it doesn't suck to bring some home. I may end up putting a couple grand on the CC especially at MGM spots, but I should be able to dig out of that next month then can start saving for (hopefully) June or (probably) August. I'll make that call of which summer trip timing when I get back from this one. June would save me a few PTO days but otherwise it's a wash. Maybe one last check-in before I go, but yeah, the hype is real ...

It is nearly upon us. My retirement fund withered away ( before I retire) in a hostile desert not meant for humankind despite my full knowledge that it's a complete and total scam. Another fucking Vegas trip! Yay! Ah well. I'm not long for the world anyway, might as well spend it before I go. Buying more useless shit with what little money I have won't do me any good when I'm dead either. Might as well have some experiences with the time left instead. So, in one week I will have signed off of work and will be busily packing the carry on bag full of mushrooms and cocaine. And socks, I guess. No change to anything. Still flying, the TSA thing shouldn't be a problem now that they're being paid. Still at the Grand for 5 nights. With fucking WWE in town next week, I'd much rather be further upstrip to avoid the wrestling mouth breathers, but I know if I rebook to Aria or Bellagio now it'll be a huge bump in room cost, and I'm just not going to do that an...

The final MGM Rewards have dropped in pre-trip, so time to tally. -5 nights at MGM Grand in an Emerald One Bedroom Suite: $945 all in, would be $4635 at rack rate, savings of $3690. Whoa. -$85 Freeplay and $100 resort credit from the booking package: $185 in value. -$100 resort credit for getting to Gold last year: $100 in value. -$277 in Slot Dollars accrued: $277 in value. All together $4252 in savings over some sad shitbag with no MGM status. Very tidy indeed and best savings ever in my Vegas career. Over $4K in value before I even step foot off the plane is pretty killer. It also explains why when it comes to vacation time the answer is always Vegas. The $200 in resort credit will mean a couple good meals for the price of a tip, and the slot credit could mean millions. I intend to use the slot dollars on actual slots this time, instead of on VP, where I can't really win much from it. If I throw it into a high paying bonus slot I might actually hit something and walk away up for...

  Wouldn't be a Vegas trip without a plan post. It's the law. Wednesday 4/15 Fly in day. If all goes well with United, should be on the ground by 12:30p, in the cab and to the Grand by 1p, up to the room to unpack and out to the strip by 1:30p. Then it's a no-plan day, probably will hit some of my spots to warm up, maybe Fuel or Rematch, will need to grab some foodz at some point in the afternoon too. No evening plans either, so probably some gambles at some point to start BUILDING the bankroll, and maybe a grab and go dinner somewhere, then tits to the wind as usual in the dark hours. No early wake up call this day so could be a rager. Thursday 4/16 First full day in town. No need to rush the get up, if the previous night was a banger I can sleep in a bit. Want to make sure I'm taking care of my body on this trip. Trying to feel close to functional on the last day, not just today. Once up, the day is open, can wander a bit, maybe upstrip for a while if I want. Giants a...

  I'm due for a bit of a windfall in July. It won't be in time for my next trip, or possibly even my next, next trip, but there are finally some big benefits that will be hitting in July from getting the Iconic MGM card. Several "card anniversary" bonuses will kick in. -A yearly $200 resort credit benefit.  -A yearly "comped night" benefit, which will pay out as $250 in resort credit, and... -An additional 10,000 tier credit bonus after spending $25K on the card, which I already have. All that in addition to the $100 in Rewards Points (resort credit) that I already earned for making Gold last year, which I will likely use in April. And the monthly tier points and Freeplay based on my daily spend, which as noted in prior posts add up quickly. It's usually something like 4K tier points per month and a clutch of $50 or so Freeplay. By the time I get to the Xmas trip (or the late summer trip?), I could have like $500 in resort credit built up. That's eat...