Thursday, November 29, 2007

Thanksgiving / 2 Year Anniversary (2007) – Day 3

Saturday, November 24th, 2007:

So, after a short sleep, I was up early again (about 8:30am) for a leisurely breakfast and a stop on the casino floor. All of the buffets were full so we found the Sherwood Forrest Café in the lower level of the Excalibur. We each had a tasty eggy meal and then headed out to find a Texas Hold ‘Em table.

My proudest moment on the trip happened here: Alan put down $50 at a Texas Hold ‘Em table (playing against the dealer, not other people). He lost a few hands, and a few bucks (maybe $25 or so) and in 4 hands, one of which was a fold, I won back not only the $25 he lost but another $45 on top. I know when to quit so we headed to the Cashier and took our winnings with glee. However, when I saw “we took our winnings with glee” I mean “Alan took the money and stuffed it in his wallet”.

We wandered back upstairs in the Excalibur towards the Starbucks off for some coffee and cribbage to pass the time until the Ronn Lucas (a very funny ventriloquist) show at 3 that afternoon at the Luxor. The show was quite entertaining, albeit a bit repetitive after seeing his show at the Calgary Stampede last summer.

After the show we went… drum roll please… back to Margaritaville for some Volcano Nachos and three (each) margarita’s. After paying the tab we got back on The Strip around 6:30 and headed north to the Mirage to see the Volcano show at 7, to be followed by the Bellagio’s renowned fountain show just before 8pm.

**Bragging Moment: On our way to the Bellagio my sister called to tell me that she’d just delivered her first baby, all by herself. The Doctor walked in, asked whether she’d done it before, and when she said no, he said “well, you’re already wearing the sterile gloves, why don’t you give it a shot”. So, she did. A little girl was brought into the world by my sister. I’m still glowing with pride!!! Bragging moment over.**

We saw two Fountain shows – one song I didn’t know the other was the famous “Alleluia” that is typically heard around Christmastime. It was the perfect show to see if we were only going to get to see two. It was so impressive.

We then headed back to the Luxor to meet up with some friends of Alan’s parents (who are now our friends since we’re not just kids anymore) who had flown in from Seattle (by way of Oliver, BC). We did the only thing that was acceptable – we sat down for another margarita with them, this time accompanied by nacho chips and salsa. They’re no Volcano nachos, but they’ll do just fine. Alan managed to sneak in another margarita before we were in the last cab of the weekend, headed back to the airport for a rather long wait for our flight home. Naturally we arrived at the airport (which arguably should be called and air plane port) early to avoid line ups and rush check-ins only to discover that the majority of travelers were going to leave on Sunday. We were through security and on our way to our gate within 5 minutes. Oh, and for those of you who are worried that you’re bringing too many liquids on your flight – forget about it. They don’t even check for liquids at the Las Vegas airport. We landed safe and sound 5 minutes to one on Sunday morning (20 minutes early thank you very much) and crashed at home by 2am. Many thanks to Trevor who was kind enough to not only drop us off at the airport early on the first day of his Thanksgiving vacation, but who also picked us up in the wee hours of the morning on our way back from our vacation. We slept until noon and spent the rest of our Sabbath watching football, shows we’d recorded over the past week, and doing a whole lot of nothing.

Here we are at Thursday and we still can’t believe everything we saw and did… and I think I’m still exhausted.

posted by Meg @ 10:17 PM 5 comments

Thanksgiving / 2 Year Anniversary (2007) – Day 2

Friday, November 23rd, 2007

Wow the beds are awful at The Luxor. I was up by 8am (though tossing and turning since 6:30). I got up and showered and was ready to go by 9:15 or so. We were at the car rental place by 10:15ish… I’m likely off on my morning schedule but you get the point. We were up and on our way really early considering a) it was Vegas and b) we were on vacation.

Anyway, we had to stop in at an outlet mall (ON BLACK FRIDAY!!!) to buy a coat each as the weather was pretty chilly and windy. **Side note: Black Friday is the American equivalent of Boxing Day. The malls are RIDICULOUS. End side note.** We were in and out in 20 minutes and on our way to the Hoover Dam. Almost 2 hours later we arrived. There was a 6 car melee on the road just 8 miles north of the dam that took an hour and a bit to clear.

We went, we saw, we conquered… We took a tour which included at least 3, if not 4 elevator rides with approximately 30 other people in the same elevator, bought the obligatory shot glass and were on our way back to the hotel by 3:30. Alan won’t forgive me if I don’t mention the (approximately) 100 photos we took of the dam in an effort to share the wonder with my father, an engineer who would marvel at the marvel (ah, such wit!) of The Dam. Many of the photos are blurry which would suggest we were already feeling a booze deficiency but mostly it was windy, we were cold, and it’s hard to take pictures with the sun in your eyes. At least that’s my excuse.

We were back in our hotel room by 5pm and I was asleep by 6. Alan watched a movie or two and then he, too, was lights out by 9pm. We were both up by 11:15 when Alan woke up to take out his contacts at which point I decided that “Hey, we’re in Vegas, baby!” so we headed out to party on the strip. Destination: Margaritaville. I LOVE this place. We stayed from midnight (took about 45 minutes to walk there what with dodging the drunk 20-somethings and the pimps with their abundance of cards promising undying affection, or perhaps affectation) until about 2:30am. From there we headed up to Mandalay Bay, The Venetian and Treasure Island; pardon me “T-I”, formerly known as Treasure Island. We discovered a few things along the way:

a) Margarita’s go through Meaghan at the speed of... well, at the speed of liquid, I guess
(I saw a bathroom in each of the mentioned hotels)
b) The Pirate show at “TI” is not showing until December
c) We have to come back to Vegas to see the Pirate show

By 4am we had found a cab and headed back to the hotel for another restless nights’ sleep. On the way, we stopped for a much needed food fest (the McDonald’s in The Excalibur) and then dragged our butts back up to bed. By 5am we were in bed for a brief nap...

posted by Meg @ 10:10 PM 1 comments

Thanksgiving / 2 Year Anniversary (2007) – Day 1

For our two year anniversary (which was November 14th), Alan and I decided we would splurge and take a trip to Vegas, the (second) city that never sleeps, where sex is a commodity to be bought at all hours, for all costs, and where the booze flows freely enough to encourage the purchase of aforementioned “commodity”. Here is a brief run down of what we did, saw, ate, imbibed, etc. Enjoy!

Thursday, November 22nd, 2007:

Naturally we arrived at the airport (which arguably should be called and air plane port) early to avoid line ups and rush check-ins only to discover that the majority of travelers left on Wednesday. We were through security and on our way to our gate within 5 minutes. Oh, and for those of you who are worried that you’re bringing too many liquids on your flight – forget about it. Some woman in Alan’s security line had two HUGE bags full of liquids. Not a problem. By the way, these pictures are us before our holiday, looking bright and chipper and nothing short of excited.

Thank goodness for Alan’s foresight to bring the cribbage board. We landed in Vegas around 1 pm after a 1 hour flight and a 2 ½ hour wait at the airport. We took our bags as carry-on so we were able to just grab a cab and hit the hotel (The Luxor). We got a room on the 24th floor which gave us a pretty cool view (albeit nauseating) of the hotel lobby. We dropped our bags in the room (which was still in the process of being made up) and headed out to see The Strip, but not without first stopping for our first drink of the weekend at the bar in the Luxor lobby: Aurora. I ordered a Screw-Up (which I had to explain to the bartender as he looked rather confused) and Alan had his first of many “margaritas on the rocks, no salt”.

We wandered our way north to The Strip through The Excalibur towards Caesar’s Palace stopping in at Paris, The Bellagio and a few other places along the way which have since left my memory. On our way back, already footsore after only 2 hours of wandering, we stopped in for a margarita at the appropriately named hotspot “Margaritaville”. This was about to become my favorite place on the strip. By the time we got back to the hotel it was only 5pm. Time has a way of slowing down when in Vegas. If only we could apply this phenomenon to most other vacations we’ve had.

We cleaned up a bit and headed out for some grub as we hadn’t really eaten since we woke up… and even then I think we shared a banana and each had a “tall” coffee from Starbucks. We had dinner at “Fusia”, a Japanese fusion restaurant and then headed off to see “KA” at The MGM Grand. All in all, a fabulous show where we sipped one more drink for the evening – 6 oz. of sugary boozy sweetness mixed in with another liter of fruity fizzy enjoyment! We were in bed by midnight with Alan apologizing profusely that he was sorry he had to crap out so early. Little did he know I was more than ready for bed myself.

Time to face the awfulness that are the beds at The Luxor.

posted by Meg @ 9:45 PM 3 comments

Alan’s 27th Birthday

I’ve been lying to my boyfriend, Alan, for the last 5 or 6 weeks (well, I was; his birthday is now over so this is past tense). No, it’s not that I’ve been cheating on him, or wishing he would change… I’ve been lying to him about his birthday. I’ve been playing dumb, skirting the issue, and flat out lying that there was to be a party, gifts, or anything of the sort. On Friday, finally, all the weight was lifted.
Behind his back I planned a Poker Tournament / Birthday party, inviting his close friends from pool, curling and work. They all arrived at the house by 6:15 on Friday night. However, while they were arriving at our apartment, I was out at Alan's office "stalling" him (no, it's not what you think... dirty buggers...)

I stalled Alan by taking him out for a “beer” (Alan actually ordered a very fruity margarita) and we were home by 7pm. The house was dark and when I opened the door it took a while before anyone said anything. Then, from the black room – “Surprise”. Alan was, from what I could tell, nothing short of stunned. When we turned on the light he was surprised to see so many people, not only there for his birthday, but crammed into our tiny little one bedroom apartment.

Brian, a guy from our curling team, cooked dinner for us – meatballs, sausages, pasta and salad. It was a big hit. It also left a ton of dishes, but that’s all part of it, I guess. Every single one of my dish towels was used in the arrangement of the meal, and my decorative one is stained but it’s all for a good cause, right?

The poker was a huge hit. 11 people played in all. I’m proud to say that yet again, I was in the top 4. I went all in with Owen (or rather he and I both went all in at the same time) and we both lost. So, we came in 3rd place together, but on a technicality (he had more chip value than I did) he was third place and I was a measly 4th. But, I can’t complain, I still beat the birthday boy! Ha ha…

The rest of the weekend was rather relaxing. We did some furniture shopping on Saturday and found a table and chair set that we love from Jerome’s. We found a 3 seater sofa too but we’ll wait to get that until after Christmas, perhaps. On Sunday we went to U-Haul and rented a 4x5x4’ storage space for all the stuff that’s cluttering up our closet. It’s only $20 a month so I can hardly complain. If it’ll give me more space in my closet rather than tripping over everything (and chipping a day old pedicure… grumble grumble grumble…)

So, a big thanks to everyone who came out for Alan’s party. Enjoy the photos! A big thanks to Kathy who took the photos of the big night (she’s not in any photos… she was on the wrong side of the camera!)

As of today, only 11 more sleeps until MY happy birthday! Woot woot!!!

posted by Meg @ 12:28 PM 1 comments