Vegas, 2025, Part III

November 9, 2025November 9, 2025 FrylockLeave a comment

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My first post talked about my comps and the hotel, and my second post talked about the gambling. This post is about my bottom line, which involves some whining. You can find my review on Tripadvisor here, but this is the text:

I’m a blackjack player, and my trips are almost always just about that. That makes this a difficult review to write. In most ways, Park MGM is a phenomenal resort. The staff went out of their way to be helpful and make me feel wanted. It’s the only smoke-free casino on the strip. The spa was incredible. Just awesome. There were two issues. The first is minor: I had a Nighthawk suite. It’s bathroom wasn’t as nice as the bathroom in a regular room at Mandalay Bay. It’s floor plan is meh. Instead of walling off the bedroom, giving you the added privacy you’d expect from a suite, the foyer is instead what’s walled off. The foyer has no tables, chairs, etc. That results in wasted space. Not the end of the world. The second problem will keep me from going back. In my first four hours of blackjack, I won $1,150 on a $2,500 bankroll. Even by my standards, that’s remarkable. However, I was constantly taking with other players, so there’s no way I could have been counting cards, and how else could I be cheating? (Note: Card counting should NOT be considered cheating.) Nevertheless, one of the pit bosses made inappropriate comments towards me, constantly delivered dirty looks, and even made another player uncomfortable by suggesting I was cheating. This is unacceptable to me, but if it isn’t the sort of thing that affects you, then by all means, stay at the Park MGM. You’ll love it. I, however, will be highly unlikely to return. A single, unprofessional pit boss can overshadow the positive experiences I had with literally every other member of the staff.

This is an honest review. If you don’t gamble, or if you always lose, then you should seriously consider the Park MGM. My room is always comp’d at any MGM resort because of my M-Life Mastercard, so I don’t know how expensive it is relative to others. I’m sure you’ll spend less at Excalibur and Luxor, but among MGM properties, Excalibur is bottom of the barrel. You’ll survive there, but paying a small amount more for Luxor goes a long way.

Gambling

I skipped Vegas last year, and I’d never been to Park MGM, so prior to the trip, I went to that cesspool known as Reddit, found the Vegas subreddit, and asked what the betting limits on the tables were. I guess I bring out the trolls because all but a couple people that responded were arrogant and insulting. They all acted as if they were high rollers, ridiculing me for even inquiring about low-limit tables, which they defined as $50 per hand. (I seriously doubt these trolls play $100 tables, but if so, they’re completely tone deaf to the experiences of most gamblers.) They also accused me of thoughts I never expressed, and put words into my mouth (easily refuted by what I actually wrote) to justify their insults. I don’t know if they were ignorant or trolling, but either way, they flat out lied. Unfortunately, that subreddit gets far more foot traffic than my blog, so I’m posting this to both my blog and that easily-googled subreddit. You’re more likely to find the subreddit. This is the actual truth.

I visited (didn’t necessarily play) Excalibur, Luxor, Mandalay Bay, NY, NY, Park MGM, and Aria, and I played from Monday evening to Friday morning. My comments are limited to these casinos on those days, which are the days I told the trolls I’d be gambling. I took notes so that I could verify whether the trolls were full of shit. Wanna guess whether or not they were?

Vegas still has many $5 tables on the strip at Excalibur, which goes out of their way to advertise them on a billboard of lights, and there are a plethora of $10 and $15 tables at Excalibur, Luxor, Mandalay Bay, and NY, NY. Because of inflation, those tables aren’t the money-makers they once were, so it’s understandable that those tables pay only 6-5 on blackjack to make up the difference, but contrary to what the trolls claimed, $25 tables still pay 3-2 at Mandalay Bay, NY, NY, and Aria (at least). The trolls were claiming that you have to go to a $100 table for 3-2, but the $100 tables at Park MGM pay 2-1. I played at one for my “last hurrah” before flying out Friday afternoon. Moreover, at NY, NY, the $25 tables allow multiple splits on double aces, which is great for players. That is, I drew four aces in a row and played four hands. (On a table beneath $25, if you draw two aces, you get one card added to each ace, and that’s it. You can’t take a second hit, and if your second card on one of those hands is an ace, you can’t split again.) The point is that the rules on $25 tables are still reasonably fair to the players, and those are the tables I prefer for that reason.

The problem with Park MGM is that all the tables are either $15 tables or $100 tables. There were literally no other tables available. Of course, I can (and did) play $25 hands on the $15 tables, but then I was limited to 6-5 payouts on blackjack. My money was tied up in an account with Park MGM, so all I could gamble (practically speaking) elsewhere is what I had won. Fortunately, I won enough ($1,150) to move over to NY, NY, where things went particularly well because of the better ruleset on the $25 table. Next year, I’ll probably send my funds to NY, NY for that very reason. I could also send them to Mandalay or Aria, but Mandalay uses “continuous shuffle” machines, which I like to avoid. I didn’t notice if their $25 tables used those machines.

My strongest advice is to ignore the comments that follow on the subreddit because the trolls will just be trolls. I’ll immediately unfollow my own post because I’m not interested in what they have to say. They’re all full of shit or simply have no idea what they’re talking about. What I wrote above is what I saw with my own eyes. and it wasn’t much different than what I experienced two years ago. Ignore the trolls. You won’t get good blackjack payouts on low-limit tables, but they absolutely exist if that’s where your budget takes you. There’s no shame in that. If, like me, you play on $25 tables, then absolutely nothing has changed since 2023.

I’m no more a whiny little bitch than the casinos are.

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Vegas, 2025, Part II

November 5, 2025November 5, 2025 Frylock1 Comment

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My earlier post talked about my comps and the hotel. Now, onto the good stuff.

I finally got to a blackjack table. I withdrew $2,000 from my accout and the spent four hours at the table. I won $1,150. This is very unusual. It’s tough to earn 50% of your bankroll, but to do it in fewer than 10 hours is nearly impossible. The only reason I stopped is because I was very hungry.

Then I went to dinner at Strip Steak in Mandalay Bay. It wasn’t open when I arrived, so I spent 45 minutes losing $300 or so. After dinner, I returned to Park MGM and spent 3 hours turning my remaining $850 into $1,400. So, as of Tuesday night, those are my earnings.

Two side notes. 1) For some reason, everyone wanted me to cut the deck, and before the night was over, they were calling me the Lumberjack. 2) Until tonight, I’d never had a pit boss watching me as if he thought I was cheating. Not only did a Park MGM pit boss do that, but he actually told another player he was watching me. He made sure I heard it, and he wasn’t kidding.

This means that all my expenses that comps don’t cover are paid for. came back and won another $250 in about 3 hours, which is more in line with what i should expect. Now I’ve made enough money to pay for my airfare (< $550), tips on meals not covered by comps (maybe $300 if I tip ridiculously), and a lower bowl seat to the Vegas Golden Knights game on Thursday ($350). That gives me $150 in wiggle room to assure that, in all ways, this trip will be absolutely free despite having so much fun and eating so well.

But it’s still Tuesday, so we’ll see how much damage I can still do.

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Vegas, 2025, Part I

November 4, 2025November 5, 2025 Frylock2 Comments

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Well, I took a year off from Vegas and didn’t miss it, but this year, I came back because of all the ideas I had for a stateside vacation, it was hard to ignore the fact that my Vegas comps made the trip here so damn inexpensive. I arrived yesterday (Monday), and I’m fimishing this post up at about 10:30 am Tuesday. There’s some good and some bad, and as always some lessons to be learned. Let’s home the rest of the trip is more of the good and less of the bad.

The Good, or Should I Say the Really Good

First off, I have an M-Life Mastercard, which means that every time I pay for groceries, utilities, internet, dinner at a restaurant, etc., I earn comps as if I’m gambling. Over the course of a year, these add up, such that I walked into my trip this year with $465 to pay for meals — including alcohol but not including tips — and entertainment. I don’t drink very often, most of the entertainment options don’t appeal to me, and those that do aren’t available during the says I’m there. So, that meant steak dinner every night.

But wait! There’s more! My suite (yeah, suite) at the Park MGM was free for four nights without me having to spend any of my reward points. It just comes with the card. Nevertheless, my smoke-free room at the only smoke-free casino on the strip comes with a $400 resort credit, so in fact, I have $865 to spend. Maybe I *will* drink after all.

Oh, do you think I’m finished? Nope. It just gets better. I don’t play slots, so all these years I’ve built up a balance of “Slot Dollars” I never used. The current balance was $1,181, so I was expecting to have to burn through those dollars playing slots. If I made $10, it’d be a free $10, so why not. Well, I went to the cage to set up my account (I had wired my gambling funds ahead of time) and asked what I thought was a stupid question: “Can I covert my Slot Dollars to regular rewards?” They said yes, so now I have over $2,000 to spend on dining.

Pretty sweet.

There’s no way I’m spending that much, but the points don’t expire, and I’ll be heading down to the MGM National Harbor in Maryland in January for our office holiday party, so I plan to get there early and have a free, overpriced dinner before our event. Also, there’s always next year.

BTW, despite having recently reserved this room at Park MGM for this trip, I can still get a free room at any other MGM property. There’s got to be an upper limit to the number of nights I can get per year, but I’ve spent four nights here, and spent four nights earlier in the year (will explain in a second), and yet I havent reached that limit yet. Unbelievable.

One last thing before we get to the bad news. MGM’s program merged with Marriott Bonvoy, so those four nights spent earlier in the year? They were at a Courtyard Marriott in Ft. Wayne, IN.

I can’t imagine a better rewards program as long as you like Las Vegas.

The Bad: The Hotel Itself

The staff is great, and the fact that the entire building is smoke-free is awesome, but for me, Vegas is a blackjack trip. After eating breakfast at my favorite breakfast joint in Vegas (Ri Ra between Mandalay Bay and Luxor), I came back to Park MGM to play. There were only two blackjack tables open at 9:30 am, and both were full. I asked the pit boss if he was opening new tables, and he said, “Not until shift change at noon.” As you might expect, he unhelpfully told me that I could always play in the high limit room (minimum bet $100 per hand).

Gee. Thanks, buddy.

Moreover, those tables, and all the tables I saw last night, were $15 tables that paid only 6:5 on a blackjack.

For those not understanding, this is something of a scam. If I bet $10 on a hand and win, I get $20, which is my $10 bet plus the $10 I get for winning. Simple enough. If I get a blackjack on that same bet, I win a bonus amount instead. Traditionally, that bonus amount was another $10 (2:1), but over the past couple decades, that’s dropped to $5 (3:2). Now these low bet tables pay only $2 (6:5). There’s a logic to this — inflation makes the low bet tables worth less to the casinos — but it really cuts into any chance you have of winning without counting cards, which most people can’t do, and even fewer people can do without getting caught.

Fortunately for me, this year I planned to play only one day, which was Tuesday. I play $25 base hands, and I don’t count cards, so it seems like this isn’t much of a burden. However, if there are no 3:2 tables available, I’m stuck as if I’m playing only $10 or $15 hands. Considering that my money was tied up in an account with Park MGM, that’s where I had to gamble. If this were nothing but a blackjack trip, wiring funds to Park MGM would have been a disaster for me. In order not to have to carry $5,000 with me on my way home — I almost never carry more than $20 cash and have only $8 in my wallet for this trip — I can’t move my money over to another casino.

Side note: Because I was staying at Park MGM for the first time, I went to that cesspool known as Reddit to ask the Vegas subreddit what the tables were like there. In addition to these guys trying to swing their dicks and pretend they’re high rollers (or if they are, completely ignore the fact that most people aren’t), they all flat out lied about the nature of the tables while needlessly insulting me. (Seriously, there was no reason for the insults. They came out of left field.) On my walk to breakfast, I verified that Excalibur, Luxor, and New York New York still offer plenty of $10 and $15 tables, and $25 tables still pay 3:2. Unfortunately, as I mentioned above, I was stuck at Park MGM for gambling.

Now, the suite itself is large but not terribly impressive. Mandalay Bay’s bathrooms in ordinary rooms are far superior. It has a foyer separated from the bedroom and living room, which makes no sense. The bedroom should be separated from all the other rooms (but connected to the bathrooms). As it is, the foyer is simply wasted space. That still makes the room bigger than an ordinary room, but meh. It’s hard to ignore how great a slight redesign could be.

All of this is to say that despite coming here virtually every year for decades, you always learn something new.

More to come.

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Celebrity Deaths: Not My Greatest Concern #aging #death #celebrity #TeriGarr #RIP #travel

October 29, 2024October 29, 2024 FrylockLeave a comment

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Another day, another celebrity death. Today, it’s Teri Garr.

I never understood the concern for celebrity deaths. If you don’t know someone, their only value to you is the work they’ve done, whether in film, TV, music, or whatever. Everything they’ve done is still available to you. Sure, if they die young, then you know your’re missing out on what could have been, but that’s a selfish interest, not a concern for the celebrity in question. I have more to worry about than people who, because I don’t know them, can easily be replaced to the extent they affect my life. What do I have to worry about?

*Towers 3 and 4 on the left were my home for 4-1/2 of 5-1/2 years in Chicago.*

This weekend in Chicago was great. It really was. It was filled with nostalgia from my law school days, and allowed me to catch up with great friends. I saw the Commanders beat the Bears in improbable fashion while within enemy territory. However, there were almost as many discussions about bad news as there were discussions about good news. We discussed friends who’ve cut off contact presumably because of depression; friends who have had recent or current, serious health issues; and friends that have died. Not people I’ve heard of, but friends. Quite a few of them. People with whom I’ve dined, drank, and paintballed. One I should have married.

At my age (56), someone in my life dies every four months or so. The last one was July 16, which means November 16 is about when I should expect the next one to go. This weekend reminded me of that. That’s why celebrity deaths don’t bother me very much.

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Vegas, 2023 #Vegas #travel

December 29, 2022December 29, 2022 FrylockLeave a comment

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For this year’s annual Vegas trip, I stayed at Mandalay Bay for the first time. I’ve been doing all (or almost all) of my gambling there for a few years now, but this year I decided to stay there becomes my comps got me the room for $5 a night with no resort fee. I usually go on Columbus Day weekend, or maybe in September, but this year I spent the week before Christmas there (Monday, 12/19 through Saturday, 12/24). I went so late in the year because I had a couple of friends that were going to be there during that week, which is also why I spent six days there.

Mandalay Bay

My room was perfectly situated such that I had a view down the Strip . . .

. . . but also could watch the planes arrive and depart the airport.

And now for some live action!

https://youtube.com/shorts/Go4mB_reaKg

Okay, not that kind of action. I love watching the planes arrive and depart, but even I find watching videos of it pretty boring. Sorry (not sorry) about that. Here’s a different video that’s probably just as boring, but it’s only 9 seconds long.

https://youtube.com/shorts/6VkOrGBihTg?feature=share

The Body Exhibit

The first touristy thing I did (besides looking out my window in awe) was the Body Exhibit at Luxor. I did that Wednesday. These are preserved corpses displayed to teach visitors about the mechanics of the human body. Some of it was bizarre. Don’t believe me? Take a look (or don’t if you’re squeamish).

Seriously, these are real bodies. They all come from China. We were told by staff that they privacy laws prevents them from knowing how these people died, but rumor has it that they came to this and other exhibits across the country through less than ethical means.

What follows are a series of circulatory system fragments injected with a colored polymer that hardens in place to help you see the detail and distinguish between different parts. Don’t believe me? Read the sign.

Other than the fetuses — which I didn’t photograph — this is the creepiest display. It’s a series of slivers of a human body.

Here’s a closer view.

This next one bothered me more than it should. I’m overly sensitive to knee pain. Drives me nuts too.

I have many more pictures, but I think you get the point.

Friday

Friday night brought me to the Penn & Teller theater at the Rio. Here’s Penn Jillette warming up the crowd playing jazz on his stand up bass.

https://youtube.com/shorts/f2iVt58ggIg

Every year, I say I’m going to go, but because I had friends there, this time I actually did. It was worth it. Not only is it a good show, but it may have been the best Penn & Teller show ever. Teller recently had quadruple bypass surgery, so he wasn’t able to do the show. Penn told us that we shouldn’t worry because he’s due to make a complete recovery and come back sometime around March 2023. A little later, they showed a video of Teller from home participating in the current bit, but his part was so generic, it’s clear this could have been a prerecorded video reused at every show.

All of this was a set up. Towards the end of the show, Penn excitedly introduced Teller! I started a standing ovation for him, and he had to wave to the crowd to get them to sit down. Once he did, he did one of his famous bits. Then he joined Penn and Carbanaro for their last bit, giving them a helping hand. It was stupendous.

Saturday

Saturday was my last day in Vegas, but my flight didn’t leave until 11:45 pm, so I had a full day to do as I pleased. My friends and I started with an incredible meal at Din Tai Fung, a restaurant at Aria famous for its dumplings. It absolutely lived up to the hype. Next, I demanded that we go to a sports bar and watch my Commanders lose to the 49ers. We went to Tailgate Social Sports Bar & Grill, and after going through two pitchers, we ordered this:

The beer is Modelo, and at Tabitha’s urging, I got a pint glass with the rim coated with salt, then squeezed some fresh limes into it. It was like a beer margarita. I had never considered doing that before, but as I’m not a beer drinker, I may never do so again. You might like it though.

After the pub, I did my first escape room. Remember all that beer from the previous two paragraphs? It didn’t go well. We took an extra 30 minutes to get out of the room, and only because we requested several hints along the way. On the bright side, I met a new friend.

Yeah. I know. The sweater. My friends made we wear it. I was raised Catholic, so my perpetual guilt makes me incapable of saying no to a gift no matter how foolish I look. After that, we took an Uber back to the Luxor (where Jim and Tabitha were staying) to wait out my departure. I took a nice shot of the skyline from the road.

Sadly, I never took the time to ride that damn coaster because my friends weren’t into it. I should have. It’s a fun ride.

Going Home

I have just two more videos to show you: my take off from Harry Reid International Airport, showing off one of my favorite skylines . . .

. . . and my landing at Dulles International Airport.

We didn’t crash, so watching video of the arrival is just as boring as watching videos of planes taking off in Las Vegas. Not much to see here.

Oh, and I won $1,200 playing blackjack. Meh.

I love Vegas.

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The Little Guy #traffic #travel #psychology

November 13, 2022November 13, 2022 FrylockLeave a comment

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A while back, a Reddit post from three years ago began circulating again. It referenced that when the poster, and apparently everyone else, were little, they imagined a little guy that ran along fences, power lines, etc. while on a road trip. I did so as well, but my guy did something else that neither the tweet, nor the replies, discussed. My guy was a risk taker.

Passing Zones

On a long road, in addition to zones where no one may pass, lane dividers will occasionally create three zones in succession: 1.) one where only one side can pass, 2.) another where both sides can pass, and 3.) a third where only the other side can pass. In case it isn’t clear, I’ve edited an image I found to describe what I’m talking about, which I’m sure you’ve all encounters.

*I’ve never seen lane dividing lines printed this way.*

I’ve ridden across the country on many occasions and never seen the three zones painted in this order. I’ve always seen them in the order I presented them — 1, 2, then 3 — with no interrupting “nobody gets to pass” zone. YMMV, I guess, but my little guy always had to deal with them in this order.

My Little Guy’s Game

This is the additional game my little guy had to play. Like a passing car, he couldn’t switch lanes unless he had dashed lines. He’d switch from my lane to the other lane when he had the dashed lines on my side, then see how long he could last before switching back to my lane. The goal, as you might expect, was to make it all the way to the third passing zone, switching back to my lane at the last possible moment. However, if he got caught in the other lane because he couldn’t even make it to the second zone, he was killed. I also recall several instances where he’d bounce back and forth between lanes in the second zone. That was perfectly legal under the rules of the game.

My decision of when to move him over was dependent on how heavy traffic was and visibility. I had many instances where his ability to last was disappointing but remember only a couple where he died. Whenever that happened, I shivered.

Are any of you this crazy?

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Bull Riding #travel #rodeo #BullRiding

November 4, 2022November 4, 2022 FrylockLeave a comment

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On Tuesday of this week, I hinted at an interesting story pertaining to my visit to La Cruces, New Mexico.

I was visiting El Paso, Texas for — if you can believe it — the second of three times total. (Who wants to go to El Paso more than once?) At someone’s suggestion, we headed over to La Cruces for a bull riding event. It wasn’t a full rodeo. All of the competitions were bull riding. I didn’t expect to enjoy this show at all, but I’d absolutely see another one if it were ever convenient. Moreover, rodeo clowns are amazing. That’s not sarcasm. They’re remarkably good at what they do and save riders from serious bodily injury and/or death multiple times a night.

In an of itself, that would be interesting (though nothing to wake the kids over), but there’s more to this story. During the event, they held a customary game of “cowboy poker” or “suicide poker.” Everyone’s sitting around a table pretending to play poker, then they let the bull in. The last one remaining in their seat wins. The bull hung out for a few seconds. It appeared he wasn’t going to do anything. Suddenly, he charged the table. The one woman at the table was caught beneath him, and her life was saved not just by the rodeo clowns, but also by the other player who was “scalped” by the bull. Everyone survived. The scalped guy was on the radio later that week telling everyone that was complaining about the event to calm down. He knew the risks and accepted them. Whether he eventually changed his mind and sued, I don’t know. He really was a hero for jumping in and saving that woman. On the other hand, the two cowardly New Mexico University football players at the table bailed on her as quickly as they could.

The video of it made a bunch of “events gone horribly wrong” compilations over the years. Here’s an example video with a story on the event (embedding not permitted by YouTube due to age restrictions). It gets a little gory, so you may not want to watch.

Now, of course, you’re going to.

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Your US Level (Whatever That Means) #home #geography #USA

November 1, 2022November 1, 2022 Frylock1 Comment

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A couple of weeks ago, a website tool started circulating social media. It produces a map of where you’ve lived, where you’ve stayed, where you’ve visited, etc. You can read the legend.

The question everyone asks is, “What’s the difference between stayed here and visited here?” My answer is that stayed here requires an overnight stay, whereas visited here requires that you went there to visit a particular place for the day, then returned home at the end of the day/evening. For example, I went to Wisconsin twice: Once for a day of paintball, and the second time to visit Lake Geneva, home of Dungeons & Dragons. When I was finished, I went home to Chicago. Likewise, I attended a bull riding competition in La Cruces, NM while visiting El Paso. Once the event was over, I went back to El Paso. The bull riding event was more entertaining than I expected, but there was an aspect to it that was even more interesting. That’s a story for another day.

For the record, stopped here means I stopped to use a rest area or eat, and passed here means I drove through without stopping. In no event am I including layovers at airports or flyovers on a commercial flight from one place to another. Otherwise, I could say that I passed here with one of the Dakotas, Wyoming and/or Montana, and Idaho when I flew between Minneapolis and Seattle. I don’t think that should add to my score.

I seem to have a higher score than most of my social media contacts, but the highest I’ve seen is 191. That guy’s been everywhere. My mission remains to stay (here) at the four purple places.

And for the record. . . .

Someone on Facebook asked me, “Why Germany but not Austria?” For the most part, I have no touristy reason for picking one country over the other. I’ve never been overseas. In fact, I’ve never been outside the continental United States except for Juarez (twice), Montreal, and Vancouver. My family tree has four distinct branches: German, Irish, Italian, and Scottish. All but the Italian portion has a nonnegligible amount of Dutch in it. Hence, I chose those five countries. I added Iceland because I hear it’s incredible.

What’s your score?

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Vegas, 2021, Part 3 of 3: The Millennium Fandom @mortaine @Erik_Nowak @kesseljunkie #Vegas #travel

September 23, 2021September 23, 2021 Frylock2 Comments

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Introduction

Every year without a new pandemic, I go to Las Vegas for blackjack. They say that what happens in Vegas stays in Vegas, but that’s not really a problem for me. I usually don’t even drink when I’m there. This year was a little different, but still not worth hiding anything. These posts are an assortment of photos and videos from the Vegas Strip. Most of the videos are from an aquarium I visited. The images are pretty big, so if you blow them up, you should still get good resolution.

I always stay and gamble at MGM properties. My credit card doesn’t get me gas credits or airline miles; it gets me gambling comps, so everything but tips are paid for because I paid my car insurance bill, got gas, or bought food at the grocery store. The comps really add up, so I use that card for everything I possibly can. I started the trip with $1,327 in available comps ($200 added just for reserving the room, so you can get those), and that was before I sat down at a blackjack table to gamble.

| Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 |

In all my years of going to Vegas, I’ve been off-strip only twice before this trip. Once was to visit my cousin’s aunt, and the other was to play D&D. For the latter, I connected with my now-friend Stephanie via Facebook. She picked me up at the hotel, drove me to a gaming store, ran one of the early DDAL adventures, then took me to In-N-Out so I could see what the fuss was about (meh), and then took me to In-N-Out headquarters so that I could say I had been there and Erik never had.

The Millennium Fandom

This year, Stephanie had a free day Wednesday, so she took me on my third trip off-strip. This was the first thing I saw when I entered the bar:

This bar is great. The motif is "nerd bar." Here's a small sample. pic.twitter.com/OCdk0I84bo
— Rob, also gsllc@chirp.enworld.org (@GSLLC) September 16, 2021

The Nationals World Series championship cap makes me feel like an outsider at this bar.

After this, the owner (Alex) took us into a section of the bar that was closed that night.

Alex took another picture, but it was a bit poorly timed. However, Alex pointed out that it probably caught me at a moment I was using the Force. I think he’s right.

*Star Trek >> Forgotten Realms >> Star Wars*

Next, I had to pick up a passenger. She’s why I crashed the Tie Fighter into a bunch of chairs.

*This post is becoming a slam against all my friends.*

After this, I toured the rest of the bar. I didn’t get some of the references, so please fill in the blanks if you can.

The Fifth Element‘s Water Stone.

Lightsabers, a helmet from The Mandalorian, a helmet from 300, the Iron Throne from Game of Thrones (top left surrounded by red light) and some big-ass sword I didn’t recognize. The bottom left look like bullets, and above that is a shield.

Well, sure, you can just look at these things, but ….

*Pretty sure this is a vorpal lightsaber.*

What’s that above me?

Beneath the Aluminum Falcon was this guy.

What’s that hanging above R2’s “head”?

Some Raiders of the Lost Ark stuff and stuff from video games I didn’t recognize.

The Air Stone, Pac-Man, and a mashup. I didn’t get the reference on the license plate.

Lots of masks, the Earth Stone, and a katana I don’t recognize. Is it from Highlander? Suicide Squad? Maybe it’s simply a katana.

Wall-E thinking the band would let him play that night.

I almost went back here thinking it was where the men’s room was. No reason.

Enough of this. Let’s have some more Star Trek. And what the hell? Some Hellraiser too.

*The TV is blanked out for copyright reasons, which seems silly considering what I’m posting.*

Now we have the proton pack from Ghostbusters and some Nightmare Before Christmas stuff, as well as some other things I don’t recognize. It’s hard to see from this image, but in the top right corner is an archer with an eagle on its shoulder. I didn’t get the reference, but I’d love to have that in my home. It was pretty cool-looking. The reason it’s blurry is because the lighting in the room forced me to use a “night” setting on my camera phone requiring more than an instant of exposure, and the slightest movement blurred the picture.

Unless you had forgotten, you must have known that the Fire Stone had to show up. Also, we have references to Predator, Alien, Wonder Woman, and Nightmare Before Christmas (a movie, by the way, that I didn’t see until last year).

After the tour, I noticed a couple of other things around the bar itself. First, a Batman vs. Superman sign that was behind me as I entered the bar.

Remember what I said about the camera setting? In this case, the blur created a neat effect. This is a real image. These are real people, not a drawing or touched-up photo.

Okay, but what’s the crowd like? Well, the QAnon Shaman showed up!

Finally, as I was leaving for the night, I went to the men’s room and saw this hanging on the door to the bathroom stall. Brilliant. I love this movie.

As you can see, this is my kind of bar. If you’re reading this post, I’m guessing it’s your kind of bar as well. It’s worth the Lyft/Uber trip. Oh, and a self-delivered pat on my back.

I absolutely love the stares my Pickle Rick mask gets. It never gets old. #PickleRick @RickandMorty #RickandMorty
— Rob, also gsllc@chirp.enworld.org (@GSLLC) September 14, 2021

If you think about it, between the mask and the shirt, I personally added to the nerd motif. Alex should put that picture of me on their website.

If you’re ever in Vegas, look them up. Their online store is here, though most of what I was looking for is sold out.

I bought a hat.

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Vegas, 2021, Part 2 of 3: The Shark Reef at Mandalay Bay #Vegas #travel

September 22, 2021September 23, 2021 Frylock2 Comments

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Introduction

| Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 |

Shark Reef

Normally, I don’t do much more than eat, sleep, and gamble, but I added this stop to my itinerary on Wednesday. Here are a bunch of pictures and videos presented in the order I took them (to the best of my recollection). There’s a small bit of commentary, but these are mostly just for your viewing pleasure.

*Gator? Caiman? I didn’t read the placard.*

This next one freaked me out. Mostly, he kept his eyes closed but occasionally opened them. I caught him with eyes opened. Seemed annoyed.

This one was just weird looking. I thought it looked prehistoric, so it was worth a photo.

Next up is the touch pool. You’re permitted to reach into the water (maybe 1-1/2 feet deep) and, using only your index finger, lightly stroke the rays or horseshoe crabs. These were clearly juveniles based on size.