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

It dawned on me today that, hey, after 30+ trips, I know some shit about Vegas. I will begin to impart this sage, invaluable, Yoda-like wisdom in this post. I will add a snippet here and a snippet there (and a snippet everywhere) as I think of things that may make the Vegas-ing easier for those less infinitely knowledgeable than me. Which is all of you. This will be a LONG post eventually. Rooms and Resorts: Don't Get Hung Up On It! A big mistake I see on the Vegas Message Board (basically THE clearing house of Vegas-going wisdom) is people asking "where should I stay that has the best this or the best that". It's a trap that's easy to fall into. With other vacation spots, you are sort of locked into one resort or vacation area. In Cabo, you generally book an all-inclusive and you more or less stay rooted there. In the mountains, you're going to pick a ski resort and pretty much stay and play there, and so on. It can be a good thing, as you don't ...

Adding one more toy to the Xmas trip toy chest. Picked up a Pixel 4 XL through Google Fi. I've flirted with the idea of getting a 4 or 4 XL to replace the 2 year old Pixel 2 XL I have now, and even test drove the Pixel 4 at launch. The 4 has some cool features and I love the design, but the small size, battery life (crappy) and price (high) made it too hard a sell. Come a month later though, and presumably due to sluggish sales the Pixel line is on 50% off through Fi for Black Friday. The $450 discount comes in the form of service credits, so once I clear a 60-day activation period I will have basically no-cost Fi service for around 15 months. I will just need to pay the cost of no-interest financing the phone, so that will be around $40/month, which cuts my bill down by over $20 a month. Sold. Also getting another $200 in cash for selling the 2 XL so the actual cost of the phone ends up at $250. That's ridiculous for a flagship. The 4 XL has wireless charging, face un...

Countdown is well and truly engaged for Winter Vegas Extravaganza 2019. Today marks 30 days until touch down. All planning on target to be in a great place for the trip. I will have $2K saved as of Friday on the way to $4100. I have nothing left to buy until trip time aside from the normal monthly and daily expenses, reduced as they will be, and the Mlife credit card is in a good place to be mostly clear by go-time. I always obsess about having enough dough on trips but always comfortably do when the time comes. No changes to the itinerary or the plan, and don't foresee any. Plane/room situation locked in, Allegiant in, Mirage for two nights and Cosmo for five. Couldn't change flight or Cosmo anyway without forfeiting them. Then the "plan" part of things looks good to me, don't see any need to add or subtract. Good mix of things to do days balanced by total freedom days. In short, I'm ready to GO. Life, oh life. Work is going well, should be a pretty ...

On paper pretty high overhead this time, but in reality a good bit of savings this trip. -Two nights at the Mirage, comped, would have been $99/night so $198 saved. -Five nights at the Cosmopolitan, $405, would have been $670 so $265 saved. -Atomic Saloon Show ticket, $48 through Vegas.com, normal price $83 so $35 saved. -Reservation at Jean Georges Steakhouse at Aria, estimating $120, will use Mlife Express Comps so $0. $120 saved.  -Will have another approximately $50 of Express Comps to use, $50 value. So altogether around $670 of savings over Joe Jimbob Nocomp from Poughkeepsie. Solid. I do have a pretty high flight obligation this time but since I'm flying on a bargain basement airline I shelled out for comfort things like a forward seat, priority boarding and an overhead carry-on spot. I've gotten to the point in my trips where if I can buy myself out of discomfort or stress on flights I am more than willing to do that. Getting the nights at the C...

Whelp, the final trip of 2019 is nearly upon us, so time to lay out what the hell I'll be doing. Leaving work on the 20th and headed straight to OAK from there by Ubering to BART, leaving the car in the work garage for the week. Arriving late after the flight, won't be in town until 10p, so straight to the Mirage from the airport, get checked in and drop off the bags, then will head out for a little snack and probably some moderate drinking. Maybe hang at the Venetian/Palazzo complex as it's across the street from the Mirage. No gambling this first short night, keeping the full cash spend in place for the 6 days to follow. Saturday, probably a nice relaxed, sleep in type of morning, no plans for the day so I can settle into things and not feel like I'm in any rush to get all "Vegas-y". This is the added day to the trip, so I'm going to try to ease into the trip and not get too gambled and drinked out. Still, it is Vegas, so whatever happens happens...

Got a ticket to see Rise of Skywalker in Vegas. Prime seat in IMAX, right in the middle of the theater at a good time, 11:30a. Won't have to be up too early after a couple day's shenanigans. Only $13, so a cheap way to be entertained in town for a couple hours, and to give my head time to clear from the night before no doubt. So I will have completed my destiny and seen all 3 of the new trilogy in Vegas. Bit of an Xmas tradition 3 of the last 5 years. I'm not expecting much from this one honestly, TLJ pretty much murdered this trilogy, and I'm dubious that it can be saved but at the very least SW movies are all a spectacle. And hell, it's cheaper than sitting in some video poker bar grinding on a machine with a hangover, which is probably the only other thing I'd be doing at that hour. And that, friends, ends the planning for the Xmas trip. A movie on the Monday, a show on Tuesday, a meal on Wednesday, and nada on Saturday, Sunday, and Thursday. Nee...

Added one more day (and a night) to the Xmas trip. I have a shit ton of time off during the Xmas-New Year break. With 12 days off, 4 3/4 days was just feeling a little short for an Xmas trip, especially since past Xmas trips have gone as long as 7 full days. SO, I added a two-night stay at Mirage, comped, at the start of the trip. I'll now be flying out late Friday the 20th, getting in at around 10p, and the back end of the trip stays the same with me flying out the following Friday at the same time I had originally booked. The change fee on the flight means I'm paying damn near $300 on just the flight this time, but I spread the cost out over time and cards so not too much pain. It'll all be paid off before I'm even in the air. Same deal: priority boarding, 4th row seat and a carry-on both ways. So it'll be two nights at the Mirage, which is cool, and then the full five nights at Cosmo that I had already booked. 7 nights, 6 days, as they say. No need for f...