The surviving ferris wheel being built behind the Flamingo. It will be the largest in the world upon completion. The other ferris wheel further south has been abandoned.
The half-way point of our vacation and we wisely beat the crowd for breakfast at Paris, a tradition we forgot to undertake last year. I will never deny that the Outfit was a bunch of criminals responsible for numerous, vicious crimes but when they ran this town, the food was cheaper and the employees were treated better. Nowadays, Vegas is operated by a different batch of criminals who can walk around in the open, namely the Venetian’s owner Sheldon Adelson.
Case in point, this year, breakfast at Paris was $24 each. Three years ago, under $18 each. Paris is part of the Caesar’s Palace group of casinos which is taking a bath on too many bad developments, namely the abandoned ferris wheel on the south end of the Strip if the locals are correct.
I didn’t care too much. We don’t stuff ourselves at every meal anymore and I was itching to have their made-to-order crepes alongside fancier dishes.
Afterwards we picked up on the Maggi Republic Video Poker Invitational. I cinched the prize this year, 4-1 by getting four 6s, doubling my $20 and then some! We’re going to get the elusive Royal Flush some day…$1000! It’s possible. I’ve seen others win it twice.
Then we headed north to walk of the itis from breakfast, maybe take in Bally’s, Mirage, wherever. We didn’t make it past Bally’s because we volunteered to watch a TV show to help the producers and/or network out. In exchange, we each received $25. Why the hell not. I would’ve done it for free since most network TV is crap.
What did we see? A mostly finished episode of the new Ironside starring Blair Underwood. It was alright. Underwood was cool. The supporting characters need more time to develop otherwise they were vanilla cops. I had read about this via The Onion yet I gave it more support through my memories of the Raymond Burr version; I often watched it on Friday evenings before the late night horror movie to follow.
The experience was rather draining so we mostly relaxed back the timeshare only to be kicked out in a couple hours. Day four is traditionally housekeeping’s visit to refresh our suite with new towels, take out the garbage.
Somara decided to stay in, take it easy with a book. I wandered the Strip, got a better movie of Showbot’s antics, ate at Nathan’s, met some LA Kings fans (they do two pre-season games here, 15 years running) and looked at how Imperial Palace has been transformed into the Quad.
Friday and Saturday nights are fascinating people-watching times in Las Vegas. It re-affirms my theory about how LV is LA’s sluttier, younger sister, trying to outdo the older more established gathering of skanks and douchebags. The difference? LV’s are from around the world while LA’s are often more local. There are actual attractive people you see occasionally, they’re far and few in between. The Europeans are easier to spot, they aren’t as heavy looking and are less likely to have regrettable tattoos. It’s also a polyglot paradise to practice identifying foreign languages. I’m glad I am no longer single too. Meeting women would be nothing but a continuous disappointment on a larger scale than 1997 was.
Gambling Report:
- Video Poker: Steve 4, Somara 1 ($38.75, $0). Steve wins!
- Somara: No idea, I guess -$100
- Steve: -$14.25: VidPoker -$13.75; Football +$9.50; Craps +$5; Roulette -$15.