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

The money pressure is...off. Decided to stop paying 24% interest every month on my hard-to-kill CC debt and took out a loan against my 401k at 8.5%. Will pay off the card this month and still have a little extra to put toward the Vegas cash fund.  I will pay back the loan via payroll deductions (painless) over 4 years and all the interest goes back into my 401k account, so essentially I'm paying myself the interest instead of some bank in Omaha. With this I can get back to living within the means on the CC, paying it off every month and in the long run saving money lost to ridiculous CC interest. So the $2K I'm banking here for cash, along with the work bonus coming in early December knocks the Vegas cash save dead. Won't have to scrimp too much or get creative over the next month to make the save number, as I was going to have to otherwise. Also won't have to murder the CC in town as I'll have a full $1K per day (or maybe a little more) while there. Is this ideal, ...

  Discounts and freebies, the 2024 Xmas edish. -5 nights at Freddies Aria: Stay Well Strip View King, $442, 3 nights comped, would be $2328 rack rate, savings of $1886 (youch). -$50 Freeplay, $50 Resort Credit on booking package, $100 value. -$230 in Rewards Points (resort credit), ~$200 in Slot Dollars from MGM Rewards, value $430. Short list but a sweet one, and all from being a loyal MGM slave  member. $2416 saved or earned. A good haul, maybe top 5 all time? Dunno, but it makes it a doable trip whereas in this crappy financial year it may not have been possible. The room rate the star of the show, as usual. Sure, I could have stayed at a similar rate at quite a few resorts on strip this time, but not in this nice a room at this nice of a resort. With nearly $300 in RC avail, if I play my cards right that can be 3 great meals, and with the $250 in FP I will probably sit down at a triple play VP machine on dollars and try to turn it into $4K minimum. 40 days, 40 days.

Life is minimizing my Vegas. It's only going to be three trips this year. I'm accustomed, since 2014, to doing four or more. The financial realities of my life now make that difficult. Last Xmas I did OK on money, paid it forward into the Birthday trip. Birthday trip I did OK on money, paid it forward into the June trip. Then the June trip happened. I still am not, and won't be this year, fully recovered from that ass-whupping. So no late summer, early fall trip this year. 6 months of drought. I'm not OK with that. I've come to really need the time off and release that comes with a regular, every few month Vegas trip cycle. As I'm now less than 2 months from a trip I'm starting to emerge from the funk, but the funk was real. August/September were some dark days , stuck in a shitty job with no prospect for any real time off until December. I can now see the light at the end of the tunnel, but may find myself in a similar tunnel next year. The realities now wi...

I'm done. Done buying stuff before the Xmas trip. I gave up this week on any fantasies about getting the MGM CC paid off, and bought everything I will need to be Vegas-ready. Started with the return flight today. Fares just weren't coming down, and at basically a month and a half out I was concerned that they never were going to drop, so I bit the bullet and pulled the trigger on United for the come-back. $145 one way. Was able to use some points so a little less painful than it otherwise would have been. 4pm flight so not ideal, but I can just add late checkout to my rezzy and it'll be fine. The other reasonable option was Frontier and just, no. So the total cost of flights is about $315. The price of flying on the Sunday before and Friday after Xmas. Also picked up some new jeans for the trip, some new glasses to replace my 3-year old pair, and various needed underwear items. The glasses are a bit bougie, Gucci's, but I'm wearing Prada now so whatev. They are no-l...

A couple rezzy's booked. To take advantage of the windfall of MGM RC we will be luxuriating in on the Xmas trip, I have booked a couple restaurant reservations. 1st one is on the Monday at the lovely Carama in MB, where they have a killer pasta Bolognese. So nice I went back twice on the last trip. And it's MGM, so, points. 2nd is on Xmas night at the reliably great Jean Georges steakhouse at Aria, I've eaten there many a time and never a bad meal. Seems like a steak splurge is always a good idea on Xmas night, and Aria is good place to jump off from for the rest of the Xmas night once the protein is on board. With the RC dump I have to blow through, I will likely add at least one more good meal on the trip, I just don't want to load myself down with too many scheduled reservations. I'll play it by ear the other nights and just sit at the bar wherever I happen to be if I'm in need of foodz. I'd like to use up most of the RC as it will reduce the overhead on ...

Starting to get just a tiny bit of a stiffy for Xmas Vegas. The mantra a month ago was "just get through October", both in a life sense and a Vegas sense. Well, it's just a week and a bit away, and I think I'll make it. Next week is already Halloween, for fuck's sake, so yeah. Then once we're into November it's only a couple weeks until Thanksgiving and then it's almost December and then it's only a couple weeks until Xmas and then it's December 22nd.  I'm not saying I have a full heat on like I will in December, but I'm starting to take note of what's happening in town. Checking the news sites a bit more. Checking the forum a bit more. Just starting to keep an eye on things. Maybe at the start of November I start putting in 50 hands of VP practice a few times a week, to start loosening up. It WILL be a gambling trip, as I will need at least 10K points once I arrive to make Gold again, which should be doable without blowing the whol...

Blah. Don't care much about Vegas right now. Usually between trips I'm obsessing about new things in town, new openings of food or entertainment venues, additions to existing resorts, and just Vegas news in general. Right now I'm just completely disengaged. Maybe it's because there's still 3 months from the next trip, with 3 months gone from the last. It's the dog days of the Vegas drought.  I have a good suite booked. I have the in flight booked. Hell I even have 2 food rezzys booked, 3 months out. But it all seems by-the-numbers right now as opposed to being excited about the trip. It's possible the Junepocalypse has taken a mental toll, losing $7500 on 6 days of vacation is not something you forget (or forgive) quickly. My tail was solidly between my legs as I sulked out of town last time, and I'm still not remotely recovered. This month will help a bit as it's essentially a 3-paycheck month and I can throw $4K at the problem, which I will.  It...