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

I went to Vegas. I did things. This is a very delayed Post Mortem as I had no keyboard on my laptop. Killed it with liquid. This is a new keyboard on a new computer. EXCITING. Not the best, not the worst trip. As it's been a while I only have generalities in my head. Pretty much went according to plan, though there wasn't much of a plan. Flight in was good, not too busy, landed and went to MGM to hang out at Whiskey Down for a few hours. Worked over to NY to check in and had to wait around as nothing was available, so had a beverage in Nine Fine while waiting. Finally got up to room, typical clean, comfy NYNY room. 5 stays, 5 good rooms. Was on a corner so not much of a view. Went out, drank a lot in bars. Gambled a little, more or less broke even. I saw Beatles LOVE on the second day. Not quite as great as I remember from the first time, but still enjoyable. Ate at Portofino, it was meh. Went out, drank a lot in bars. Gambled a little, lost a lot. 3rd day, went out, ...

Added a day to my trip. 4 days now and most of a 5th, as I don't fly out until almost 8p on Sunday. Wew lad. Decided to stay in this weekend, save a couple hundie and be able to extend the trip. So now I fly in early Wednesday, have all day Thu/Fri/Sat, and can (hopefully, if I can work out late checkout) sleep in Sunday and be back in my hobbit hole by around 9:30p Sunday night. I've got $3700 going in to the trip, and I kept thinking that I would likely add another day while there. Booking it ahead of time saves a lot of money in that respect as I moved around my comp days to have the cheapest night be the one I added. Only $56, Mlife rate. So even with the devil Resort Fees I still come in under $200 for the room. Going a day later on the flight did cost me another $150, but I dare say that would be a lot less than if I booked it day before or day of. So all in $430-ish trip overhead, still less than all the freebies I'm cashing in. I can just take it a bit ea...

Pretty good haul of Mlife and myVegas freebies on this trip, unexpectedly. The 3 comped room nights goes without saying. Freeplay. I've mentioned the Beatles LOVE ticket, which is great. Then today I somehow hit the lottery on myVegas Loyalty Points (the things you can actually cash in for rewards) and have enough now to do a $25 food credit at Nine Fine Irishmen, one of my fave places in Vegas. The food's not out of this world, but it's good comfy pub grub, it's onsite at the resort I'm staying at (so no unnecessary roaming) and there's no minimum buy so I can get an entree and a couple drinks and have it be basically taken care of. I'll be going in there anyway, for fuck's sake. I will also still have enough LP's by the time I go to cash in a 2-for-1 beer flights reward at Monte Carlo next door as well. Good cheap "get fucked up" fuel. So the tally for this trip: -3 free nights at NYNY - $300 -Freeplay - $50 -Beatles LOVE ti...

OK, so I've added a LITTLE planning to the February trip. Going to see Beatles LOVE at the Mirage again. I saw it last year and it blew me away. It was my first Cirque show and I didn't have super high expectations but it was beyond great. I'm a big Beatles fan and honestly the music mixed with the imagery mixed with the acrobatics can (and did) bring a tear to the eye of a Beatles fan. It's an audio/visual assault, in the best way. The music surrounds you completely and the acrobatics are going on all over the place simultaneously. It's almost overwhelming to watch, which is why I'm going again, I know I missed a lot the first time. It's a free myVegas ticket again, up in the nosebleeds but honestly it's an intimate theatre and there's not really a bad seat to be had. I'm also centrally located so hopefully I'll be able to take more of it in this time. Little over $100 ticket value so a good use of my 40K myVegas LP's. Can maybe...

I'm thinking my May trip (so, so far away) might be a good time to test out my "stay in one resort for most of the damn time" theory of enjoying Vegas. The summer crowds in Vegas can give me, what are the words...a mental breakdown? I talked about it in my July '15 Post Mortem, it just seems like the best way to survive the summer heat and crush of summer crowds might be to just avoid both of them. Aria is a beautiful, basically self-contained resort that has plenty of bars, food and gaming to keep me occupied for the better part of four days it would seem, and though I will be leaving (at least) once to see The Cure next door at the Cosmo, I'm thinking there may be no real reason to leave aside from that. I'm sure I'll get around a bit on at least one of the days, but even there I may be able to avoid the crush of humanity on the Strip sidewalks by utilizing the Monte Carlo - Bellagio tram that runs on the backside of the resorts every 10 minutes...

The plan? No plan. I had a good trip last time at Xmas, but I stage managed it a bit too much in retrospect. I looked back at my "The Plan" post before that trip and compared it to the Post Mortem, and damn if it isn't almost a perfect match. I made 3 dinner reservations in 4 nights, added a movie and a myVegas redemption for a specific spot. It all added up to a good trip but there wasn't much in the way of spontaneity built in. It felt like I was following a script, and while the script was good, that's not always the best way to do Vegas. So I did the script last time; this time there's not even a crib note. It's a quick 3-day trip, I'm (probably) not going to make any dinner reservations (TBH I usually just sit at the bar of any resto I go to anyway, so there's not much point) and I'm not going to plan anything outside of whatever myVegas redemption I cash in, which likely will be in NYNY anyway, so no big whoop. My May trip ...

WARNING: Not really a Vegas post. Nothing to read here. New year, time for a status update. Status: pretty damn good. My job is good, I'm pretty inexpendable and more or less like the actual work. In 2013 I was actively looking for work, I thought my position was so dead-end; now that I'm in the inventory position it's truly bearable. I just passed 4 years in one job, which I think aside from my first Barnes & Noble stint is a record. I don't make a ton of money but it's enough to get me out on weekends and finance 3-4 Vegas trips a year. My health, 6 years on from a heart attack, is also fine. Just got put through a bank of heart tests that I wasn't getting with Healthy SF, and came through fine. I'm more or less healthy, aside from a couple hips that are bugging me and may need work. I'm not getting any slimmer, but I may remedy that in the coming month or so (Soylent?). Not much going on on the female front, but for the first time in a whi...