CRAZY 2013 Year End: Winning the $1,000 Ugly Sweater Contest at TAO, Running 4 Races (Mustace Dache, Ugly Sweater Run, Jingle Bell Team Challenge, Come Run With Santa), Recycled Percussion, Thanksgiving, Snow Day at Mt. Charleston, New Phone: Galaxy Note 2, Boulder City, Xmas Stuff, and MUCH more 11/25/13-12/21/13
Excuse the poor paragraph separation. I originally typed most of this up with the intention of adding lots of pics and videos between the paragraphs but the end of the year became so busy I just ran out of time! Fortunately, I managed to get vids of most of these things on YouTube (so check that out if you want to see more about anything mentioned here), will have pics on Facebook soon, and finally finishing typing this up:
We went to Denny's and IHOP a couple of times. At Denny's one of the times, I ordered some Hobbit breakfast thing (in honor of the new Hobbit movie that just came out) for $6 or so. It was pretty good and came with eggs cooked inside of bagel holes.
Some other day, Danny was craving Red Robin so he invited us to join him for burgers! So tasty!
Can't remember which cold, early December day it was but we noticed the water dish we keep in the backyard for when we let the dogs out was frozen over. Then we looked in our mostly empty pool and noticed the water that'd collected in it when it'd rained a few days prior was frozen too! Obviously the only thing we could do was take the dogs ice skating. Check out the video on my YouTube!
Another random day, the dogs were looking like they needed to get out o the house so we drove them to Boulder City for a walk. Just off the freeway we take all the way there from our house, we spotted a sign on our left leading to a Bootleg Canyon trail. We'd never been and didn't exactly know what it was but we thought it looked like as good a place as any to take the dogs and it actually ended up being an incredibly fun place to walk, run, and play around!
Our sewer got backed up awhile back and Sean and I tried for days to fix it so we wouldn't have to spend money getting a plumber to come and clear it out for us. We even bought ourselves a 50 foot sewer snake to try and snake out the clog, ghetto rigged it with a drill, and got poop all over ourselves but couldn't fix it. We finally had to get a plumbing company out to see what was wrong. They couldn't fix the problem with a snake either so they had to run a camera down and take a look. They were finally able to find the clog and unblock it enough for the water and waste to pass but when it'd cleared up they saw the source of the problem - something much worse than anticipated: a tree root had grown through the pipe and was blocking much of the passage. The plumbers quoted us $5,800 to excavate and replace the 10ft section of pipe where the blockage was or $7,200 to replace the whole line from our house to the street, since much of the pipe was sagging and a bit damaged due to old age. We didn't commit to anything right away but took their card and have been requesting quotes from plumbing companies around town, looking into repairing it all ourselves, and checking our various options to see about other ways to handle it. We haven't decided on anything yet but are working on it and plan to get it resolved within the next few week.
At the same time as the plumbing issue came up, we were hit with another problem. We had an old dent in our car that we'd been driving around with for months. We pulled up to Walmart to get some groceries but, just as we were getting out of the car, a couple pulled up to us in the parking lot saying they could fix our dent for us. We were doubtful as to how good of a job they'd do but we were able to talk them down to only $40 and we didn't figure they could make the dent look much worse. We paid and they started hammering it out from the inside. When they were done, it DID look much better but had been hammered out in a way that made it pretty much impossible to fix properly. What was worse, however, was that they'd accidentally hit and broken off the fuel pump driver module (FPDM) in the trunk of the car. Not knowing much about cars, we didn't realize what had happened for quite some time. We looked all around the car trying to work out the source of the problem before finally pulling out the trunk insulation stuff and finding the FPDM broken and laying there in pieces. We had to leave the car at Walmart for a couple of days while we called scrap yards around town asking for the part. Most didn't even have cars in which the FPDM was interchangeable with ours let alone know what part we were talking about. We even went down to our usual, local scrap yard to try and find the part but the only Mustang they had that would've had a compatible FPDM had been completely gutted. Finally, we had to resort to buying the part from eBay and waiting a few days for it to arrive. In the meantime, we needed to get our car out of the Walmart parking lot and back home. Danny agreed to let Sean and me borrow his car to push ours home as long as we didn't scratch or damage his car in any way. We packed up some pillows and blankets and drove down to Walmart to see what we could do. Surprisingly enough, it worked! It only took maybe 30-40 minutes, didn't damage either car at all, and Sean and I did it by ourselves aside from one street that a nice, random gentleman helped us get the car across. The only issue we had was that once we DID get our car home, there was no safe way to get Danny's car to push it into the driveway. The car was far too heavy for us to push up ourselves, due to the slight uphill tilt of the driveway, but we got it in enough to be safe and Danny helped us push it he rest of the way later. Our part finally came in a couple of days later and we were able to fix the car, though it did need a jump start since having the headlights on with the engine off while pushing the car home had killed the battery.
11/25/13 - 49ers vs Redskins:
The 49ers played the Redskins tonight in this week's Monday Night Football game. Sean and I got all dressed up in Niners gear to celebrate our team's first MNF game this season. Then Sean, Danny, and I drove to Gold Coast to watch the game! Despite the Niners being the away team, despite the casinos' odds favoring against them, and despite them having lost nearly half of their games this season, I was confident they weren't losing this one. I'm not a fan of betting or gambling but I put my second sports bet ever, $10, on them to win by at least 6 points.
Shortly after sitting down to watch the game, Sean's dad and Pat met up with us there! They were in town from the UK, exploring Vegas before heading to the Grand Canyon, Los Angeles, and a cruise down in Mexico. They'd brought us some tasty snacks from the UK! We all had some wings and watched the game for a bit but finally Pat got a bit tired and she and Sean's dad had to call it a night.
The other 3 of us stayed and watched the rest of the game and weren't disappointed! The Niners destroyed the Redskins, 27 to 6, and I just about doubled the money I'd bet on them. :)
Also, we won a few prizes from the raffle including tickets to see some basketball championship thing at The Orleans a few days later.
11/26/13 - Sean's Dad and Pat:
The next day, we met up with Pat and Sean's dad again at the Luxor where they were staying during the Vegas portion of their trip. They were having drinks in a bar near hotel registration. Sean and I joined them and ordered a Riesling wine to share. Then we exchanged a couple of Christmas gifts with them and sat around catching up for a few hours.
11/27/13 - Azuza Hookah Lounge:
I can't quite remember what we did during the day today but at night, probably after a long day of work, we needed a break and decided to go out for hookah. The Olive was either closed or about to close so I googled to see which hookah lounges might still be open. We came across one that seemed pretty awesome and wouldn't be closing til maybe 4am, I believe it was. It was called Azuza and was right by Johnny Rockets, across the street from the Hard Rock hotel and casino.
AzuzA Hookah Lounge & Cafe
4480 Paradise Rd #450
Las Vegas, NV
www.azuzahookahlounge.com/
Like The Olive, Azuza looked awesome inside. It looked pretty cool from the outside too!
The prices weren't the incredible and we didn't particularly like the 1 drink per person minimum but I guess it was average enough for a hookah lounge. We didn't particularly want alcohol at the time, especially since it'd take about $50 or more just to get ME drunk and we'd still have to drive home, but we ordered a pot of Alwizah Egyptian tea (a teapot for two for $6) and double apple and mint hookah to share. Unfortunately, when they brought the bill at the end of our night there was a mixup. They tried to charge $8 instead of $6 for the tea, saying the menu was wrong and should've said $8, and gave us a bit of a hard time before agreeing to charge us the advertised price. I wouldn't have minded but it was the principle.
Anyway, we had a lot of fun in the meantime. The waitress was a sweetheart and kept bringing us tea refills, though I actually don't think she was supposed to with this particular deal. Most of the music they played was good and had plenty of bass. It was a small-ish place but the atmosphere was cozy and fun, the way a relaxing night out should be. We spent a good few hours there, killing time, taking a break from the world, people watching, and talking. I almost wasn't ready to leave when we finally decided to call it a night but we planned to go back sometime, possibly with more friends and definitely at a point in time when we didn't mind splurging a bit for a good time.
11/28/13 - Thanksgiving:
Thanksgiving Day!! This was Sean's second Thanksgiving celebration EVER. (He's from the UK.) We had a VERY late night, mostly because we stayed up gaming (I even managed to get my hands on some cool, Deadric weaponry in Daggerfall!), so we actually ended up stuffing and cooking our turkey this morning before going to sleep.
Then we slept pretty much all day and didn't wake up til evening. After finally getting up, we got to cooking everything else. Danny was at his parents' house, where he'd been all day, so it was just Sean and me and our 3 very hungry dogs! It took a few hours but we pulled together a feast. We had wayyy too much for 2 people and 3 dogs to eat but all the better. We'd have tasty leftovers for weeks if not months! We had egg nog (both alcoholic and non-alcoholic), 3 types of wine, coffee, tea, Tampico, turkey, ham, potatoes, carrots, parsnips, brussel sprouts, green bean casserole, stuffing, gravy, cranberries, nuts.. It barely fit on our table and we'd upgraded to a bigger table than last year's! Funniest part: Sean and I barely managed half a plate each before filling up. The dogs ate BUNCHES though - so much, in fact, that they started turning down turkey and trying to bury the meat and bones we have them!
11/29/13 - Basketball at The Orleans
At least I think this was today.. Sean and I took the tickets we'd won from the raffle during the Niners MNF game and went to see the basketball games at UNLV. We were in and out of the stadium for a few hours, watching a bit of one game, getting some cool-looking Ales and sprite to mix from the Terrible's gas station across the street, getting some food to eat at TGI Friday's, going back to watch a bit of another game, and finally getting too tired and having to go home. Lol At least we'd had some good, cheap fun and gotten out of the house though!
11/30/13 - Mustache Dache, Classic Cars, and more!
We had another race today and Danny was doing this one with us too! This one was the Mustache Dache 5k.
Location:
Downtown Las Vegas
Fremont St. and N 6th St.
Las Vegas, NV 89199
Start Time: 9am
None of us had mustaches but we couldn't run this race without a little upper lip fur! Luckily, I'd prepared without even knowing it. I pulled out my costume box and found my collection of single-use mustaches I'd been waiting for an occasion to use.
We picked up our race packets just before the race. With them, we got awesome Mustache Dache t-shirts (red for the ladies, grey for the guys) and temporary mustache tattoos.
Sean was much faster than Danny or I could hope to be so he went on ahead of us and Danny and I decided to run the race together. Danny hadn't run any races other than the 4K-9 run with us earlier in the month but, surprisingly, he almost managed to keep up with my pace and only had to stop for a moment to drink a sip of water at a refreshment station. I stuck with him all the way, except my trademark sprint finish I can't resist, and he didn't have to ask me to stop or slow down once! I only sprinted the last 50 meters or less yet my time was just over 2 minutes worse than my best 5k time. Danny had never even run 3 miles in one go before. Not bad!
At the finish line, we collected our super cool finishers medals. Then we picked up some complimentary protein bars and coconut waters before checking the race results. Sean ended up placing 13th of 689 runners! I got 167th and Danny got 176th.
The post-race festivities were pretty rad. There was free mechanical bull riding and a DJ to liven up the place. I'd never ridden a mechanical bull before so I had to try. It didn't go too well but it was definitely an experience!
We couldn't get Danny to get on but Sean had a try after me. He did better than I had but it wasn't his first rodeo. Lol
Then, Sean and I went to dance like crazy people in front of the DJ table! We shook our butts and wiggled our bodies and even gave each other piggy back rides while spinning in circles. It was so fun and ridiculous!
All 3 of us got really hungry after the race so we decided to drive out to Boulder City for the buffet at the Hacienda Casino. When we arrived, the parking lot was busier than we'd ever seen it and they were hosting both a classic car show and a chilli cookoff!
Though we'd been to the cafe at Hacienda several times now, it was Sean's and my first time getting the buffet there. We couldn't have picked a better time though. I was absolutely starving and ate almost all of this and more!
12/3/13 - Insidious 2:
I'd seen Insidious with Danny when it came out in theaters I'm 2010, I believe. Sean had never seen it before so he and I watched it together a few days ago. Being $1 Tuesdays at the cheap Regency Tropicana movie theater tonight (as opposed their regular $1.50 admission per person any other day), we checked what movies were playing and saw they had Insidious 2! How convenient. :) Danny joined us and the 3 of us drove down to see it! We were all pretty hungry so Danny got himself a popcorn, candy, and 2 sodas deal and Sean and I paid him for 1 of the sodas and got a $1 (or maybe $1.50?) hot dog each! Unfortunately, Danny got called into work part way through the movie but we saved his snacks for him. The movie ended up being pretty good for a horror movie and Sean even stayed awake through it! Lol
After the movie, Danny met back up with us and we all went to eat a bit more at the IHOP about a minute away.
12/5/13 - Dog Park:
Today was nice day and we thought the dogs might want to get out of the house for awhile. We were hungry too and had some Sonic coupons we we loaded the dogs into the car, got some tasty but inexpensive food from Sonic, and drove to the nearby dog park for lunch! The dogs had lots of fun sniffing, meeting, playing, and running around with other dogs and we had a good time eating our food, enjoying the fresh air, and running around with the dogs too!
12/6/13 - Boulder City:
We needed to go yard sale'ing to pick up things we could resell or make into other things to sell but we were also thinking that we hadn't yet gotten a good daytime look at Boulder City. We only had a couple of hours before we had to take Danny to the airport for a Washington ITG tournament but that was enough time for us to explore a bit and check a few things out! We drove to Boulder City and our first stop was this estate sale we spotted and picked up lots of goodies at.
We got a couple of dollar menu items at Jack In The Box after that and then drove on to see Historic Boulder City for the 1st time during daytime hours.
We only had a little while to look around but we stopped in a few stores, peeked in the windows of a few others, and even got his creamy and tasty Route 66 root beer for $3!
12/9/13 - Mount Charleston (SNOW!):
We'd heard parts of Vegas had gotten snow recently but we had yet to see any for ourselves. We wanted a little white winter too we drove up to Mount Charleston today!
We got to the Mount Charleston Resort at 1:38pm, changed into our winter wear, and played around on the very frozen lake there.
Then we drove on a bit to Mary Jane Falls Trailhead. There was so much snow there! We walked the snowy trail for a few minutes just for a look around.
We had some snowball fights, battled it out with a snow-munching challenge and a wrestling match, played a little frisbee (we came prepared!), and took some funny, "sexy" winter pics for the album.
Back near the car, we tried to make a snowman but the snow was too fresh and wouldn't clump up. Instead, we took turns burying each other in the snow and sliding down a hill on a styrofoam Ninja Turtles pool thing we found. So fun!!! We would've taken even more pics and vids but our phones both ended up getting too cold and shutting of! Lol
When we were both absolutely chilled to the bone and our hands were in such excruciating pain from the cold we didn't know what to do with ourselves, we finally headed back to the resort to thaw ourselves out over a couple of festive drinks in the bar! I'd never had alcoholic cocoa before but according to Sean it's a thing. I let him handle the drink-ordering and he got us one hot chocolate with amaretto and one with brandy. The amaretto one came out reeeeally nice but the brandy one was super strong and we had to take it home with us for another time. Still, we weren't complaining. It was happy hour and alcohol-wise we definitely got our money's worth!
Still needing to warm up, we took our drinks to the sauna where we sat around sipping and reminiscing about the fun we'd had in there on our anniversary!
Finally it was time to get back to Vegas for some Monday Night Football at Gold Coast. We took a couple of snap shots with Santa and headed out!
12/10/13 - Texas Station and Drive-In Movies:
It was extra cheap movie day at both Regency Tropicana and the West Wind Drive-In theater again today. We'd gone to Regency a week ago so we went to West Wind this time.
I don't think I'd ever taken Sean inside Texas Station casino, next to Fiesta Casino's location on Rancho and just down the street from West Wind, before so we left a bit early and stopped in there first. Inside Texas Station, we visited the arcade, ran into a former fellow Gemini gamer named James who works in Texas Station's arcade, shared a credit on the DDR Supernova machine there (2P pad is pretty good, 1P needs some work on the down and left arrows), and got a couple of tasty margaritas at one of the casino bars for $1 each!!
At West Wind, we paid our $9.50 total admission and watched a pretty good Jason Statham movie called Homefront while chowing down on lots of snacks we'd picked up at 99 Cent Store during the day.
As usual after leaving the drive-in, we weren't ready to go home but couldn't think of anything else open and worth visiting. Luckily, one exit away from home, we remembered we hadn't seen Sam's Town's Christmas setup yet this year so we popped in for a look!
12/12/13 - Hofbrauhaus:
At the end of a long day, or at least a long evening, Sean and I were starving. I'd always wanted to see what the huge, local, German restaurant Hofbrauhaus was all about but had never gotten around to going. Sean and I had gotten an email offer for a free beer with any entree purchase though so tonight was the night!
Hofbräuhaus
4510 Paradise Rd
Las Vegas, NV
www.hofbrauhauslasvegas.com/
I think the restaurant was more or less what I'd expected except that I'd thought it would feel just slightly more homey and less like a cafeteria. The prices were a little higher than ideal but not completely ridiculous. The menu could've used a few pictures since everything was so foreign and it was hard to know what you'd receive after ordering (ie: the entree we ordered told us what items we'd be getting but we didn't realize they'd all be fresh and randomly scattered around our plate. We didn't mind at all but it did come as a bit of a surprise!). The food we ordered was simple but tasted good and was fresh. My favorite part was the pretzel with mustard! The beer was good as far as beer goes too.
12/14/13 - Ugly Sweater Run, TAO Nightclub, and $1,000 Prize (We Won!!)
Sean and I had another "race" today but this one was strictly for fun and a bit of exercise!
The "race": The Ugly Sweater Run
Location: Downtown Las Vegas - Fremont and 6th St
Start time: 11am
Link: http://theuglysweaterrun.com/locations/las-vegas-nevada/#.UrVoMWS9Kc0
There were no medals, prizes, sports drinks, or protein bars. The race wasn't even timed but that was the point of it: dress up in your ugliest sweater and run! It was a fun run with water, hot chocolate, and candy canes! There were big, inflatable Christmas props every so often during the race and fake snow just past the start line. Registration included awesome Ugly Sweater Run beanies, temporary blue mustache tattoos, and vouchers for 2 Samuel Adams beers (technically cider, lager, or winter lager) per person. Sean and I had registered as a team (Team BBC!) and shared the event on Facebook so we got a $20 discount on race registration. After fees, it came to $38.07 per person, $76.14 for the two of us. Unfortunately, we hadn't been able to find any ugly Christmas sweaters while shopping around town so I spent most of the night before the race decorating some plain red ones for us with misc Christmas decorations we had around the house!
Anyway, Sean and I arrived in our sweaters about half an hour before the start of the run and picked up our race goodies. It was getting a bit warm for the sweaters but we sure as hell weren't taking them off and neither was anyone else! The run started just after 11am and there were sooo many people there running and walking in their sweaters!
Since it was just a fun run, Sean and I ran together this time, only stopping once to grab some hot chocolate and water. Everyone really seemed to be enjoying themselves a lot - especially us. We loved the props, the sweaters, and the Christmas spirit and I loved the bells I'd put on the sweaters. We were jingling all the way!
For a look at the totally awesome, super fun Ugly Sweater Run, check out my YouTube channel!
After the race, we grabbed some more hot chocolate and candy canes, enjoyed the music the dj at the event was playing, and picked up our post-race beverages. :p
They had a few ugly sweater contests after most people had finished the race. We entered one but didn't win since the way to win was by getting the most people to cheer for you and most people cheered for a guy with a normal sweater but holding a chihuahua under his arm. Can't much blame them though. The dog was adorable! We didn't mind losing anyway because the prize was just a pint glass with the race name on it and all the contestants received Santa hats as consolation prizes!
Headed back to the car after the run, we passed a nearly naked Asian guy on Fremont Street posing for pics with people in order to get tips. It looked funny and ridiculous so it seemed totally worth it to give him $1 for a couple of pics with us in our sweaters.
The Ugly Sweater Run had advertised free admission to TAO nightclub at the Venetian with purchase of race registration but we later found out admission to TAO is free for locals anyway. I'd been needing a night out for a LONNNNG time anyway though and TAO was hosting an Ugly Sweater Contest with a $1,000 prize for the 1st place winner and a $500 prize for 2nd place that night! Clearly we HAD to go. I dressed the sweaters up a tiny bit more during the day. Then at night, actually a little after 11pm, Sean and I finally got dressed for clubbing, pulled on our sweaters, and drove to the Venetian! We arrived in the parking lot a little before midnight but we were way too sober. Sean drank some margarita he'd made at home. I had a bit of margarita and several sips of jäger. Then it was finally time to party!
I think it was midnight by the time we reached TAO and there was a pretty long time to get into the club. We walked up to the club's bouncers and asked them whether it was too late to enter the ugly sweater contest. They said entry was just about to end and let us skip the whole line and go straight in (after being ID'd, of course). When we got inside, the person in charge of the contest had already left his counter and it was looking like it was too late to enter but we managed to hunt him down and apparently just in time! He said we were the last 2 to enter out of a total of only 15, actually, and had us fill out entry forms and pose for pics in our sweaters. Then it was off to explore the club, get some drinks at the bar, and hit the dance floor looking absolutely ridiculous!
We started with a shot each at the bar. Sean had tequila and I had my signature 151 to get me in the mood and we both had coke as a chaser. The bill came to a crazy $27 but we were already a bit too drunk to care. Besides, just before we got our drinks, a group of people came up to us, complimented our ugly sweaters, and gave us two free drink passes for the bar there (which we saved for later)! Then some Australian girl came up to us, complimented our sweaters, and asked to do a shot with us. We chatted a bit, waited for her to get her drink too, an did our shots together.
A few minutes later, the Australian girl's guy friend showed up, also complimented our sweaters, and offered to buy us drinks too! We gratefully declined and moved on to see more of the club including the awesome outdoor balcony area that looks out over the Vegas strip and the front of the casino where the Venetian had their Christmas tree and ice skating rink set up.
Back inside, we hit the dance floor and got crazy!! Everyone was complimenting, insulting, and staring at our sweaters or simply saying, "THAT is an ugly sweater!" and offering to buy us drinks but we were already drunk enough so we just smiled, thanked them, and got on with things. After awhile, some club-employed girls dancing on stage starting throwing cool, orange, TAO light-up sticks to everyone on the main dance floor. Sean and I caught a couple of them and danced with them most of the night, though Sean finally lost his somehow.
We were still on the dance floor when a TAo employee came up to us on the dance floor and asked me, "are you Aleta?". I think I'd forgotten about the sweater contest by that time so for a moment I thought I was in trouble. I'd left my phone in the car so I hadn't seen the text he'd sent me message.. but then he told me I'd won the contest (the $1,000) and to follow him! I felt bad that he'd had to come find our drunk selves out on the floor but he seemed happy enough just to see us in our sweaters. Haha Sean and I followed him to some back office in the club where we met the 2nd place ugly sweater contest winner as well as some other TAO staff members in suits and saw some funny, Chinese-style decorative statues.
In the office, we were congratulated on our win and given some forms to fill out for tax purposes. Gawd, that was tough!! Lol We managed though. Then we were escorted out of the office and back to the main club area, told we'd receive our check in the mail shortly, congratulated again, and handed 2 more complimentary drink passes! Guess it was time to make the rest of the night even hazier. XD
We hit up another of the bars in the club and asked them for the strongest thing they could give us with our free drink passes. I think we wound up with vodka and pineapple. After that, we thought it'd be a good idea to use our other set of drink passes to get a rum and coke each.
Then we wound up back on the dance floor shaking our butts, sweating in our sweaters, and partying the night away! At one point, the dj stopped everything so that everyone could rep for their areas by shouting out for their part of the country. Lol Of course, west coast was loudest. :D In honor of that, the DJ played some badass west coast music (Snoop Dogg, Dr. Dre, maybe more?)!!
It was 3am when we left the club. Closing time was 4am but we were hungry as hell and my legs were about to fall off! We wanted graveyard specials from Silver Sevens but when we got there they told us they'd stopped doing them so we went to McDonald's instead, used a coupon to get two Big Mac meals for $8.99, went home to watch whatever the hell we watched while eating, and passed out feeling accomplished!
12/17/13 - Recycled Percussion:
We've sold a lot of bottle lamps over the past few months so we were low on a lot of the popular types like Jäger and Jack Daniels. We texted our bottle supplier and told him we needed another $20 or so worth of bottles (just over 40 bottles) and drove to his house to pick them up at 11am!
Our friend Marquee had messaged us and invited us to the show Recycled Percussion at The Quad saying she had two extra tickets. I'd seen the show once before when it was at the Tropicana casino but had been wanting to take Sean to see it for the longest time! We took Marquee up on the offer and met her and her friend Deaudre, who Sean had never met but I'd met once before when a group of us girls had gone clubbing at Blush (now closed) years prior, in front of the show theater. After greetings, introductions, and thank yous for the tickets, we all selected our recycled "instruments" (mostly pots and pans) and went inside. There was a drink menu on the table and we all ordered a thing or two - a piña colada with rum for me and a strawberry daiquiri for Sean ($12 total!). Then it was show time!!
Sean loved the show as much as I'd thought and hoped he would. It was so fun and just as awesome as I'd remembered - maybe even moreso because they now had what they called "random cookie time" where they gave everyone in the audience cookies! Some weirdos didn't want theirs so I ended up with 4 cookies and Sean wound up with 5! Mmmm!!
We snapped a few pics after the show. Then we went with Marquee and Deaudre to get more drinks at one of the bars in the casino and hang out and chat.
Finally, Sean and I had to leave to meet up with Danny for food. The girls had places to be too so we all walked out to the parking garage and said goodbye. Than Sean and I went to meet up with Danny at Cane's for some tasty chicken fingers!
12/18/13 - Silverton, Circus Circus, Arizona Charlie's, and Longhorn Casino in Ugly Sweaters!
Sean and I left the house in our ugly sweaters and other Christmas gear today and got a lot of laughs, smiles, stares, compliments, insults, discounts, and more in return! we even made a couple of peoples' days!
First, we visited the Silverton casino. It was Sean's first time there, probably my second, so we had a good look around and checked out the HUGE and awesome Bass Pro Shop there.
After handling a few things back home later, we went out again to explore the town a bit. We wound up at Sean's and my most sentimental Vegas spot: Circus Circus! Everywhere in Vegas seemed dead but it didn't stop us from having a great time. We parked in the parking garage and started by walking through the casino towards Slots-A-Fun outside the front entrance. Almost everything in the casino was closed but it was fun looking around anyway!
Outside Circus Circus' front entrance (where Slots-A-Fun is), we took some pics together and a few of the casino itself. Then we FINALLY registered for players cards there and got free entries into some raffle they had going on.
As always when we walk through Circus Circus, we couldn't help but reminisce about our time there in January 2006. Neither of us lived in Vegas then but we met in at Nat'05 in Vegas and wound up living in Vegas together years later! It's crazy thinking about how we got where we are now just from meeting each other back then.
Headed back towards the parking garage, we noticed something awesome: vow renewals for only $120 at Circus Circus' chapel! We knew almost immediately what we'd be doing with our 3 or 4 year anniversary!
Then we went to visit somewhere I don't think either of us had been since Nat'05 - Circus Circus' 3 story hotel room blocks behind the main hotel and casino section where everyone who'd stayed at Circus Circus for Nat'05 was accommodated! There were 5 blocks of rooms (A, B, C, D, and E). Neither of us was sure which block we'd stayed in at Nat'05 but I'm sure we could find out through pics and such. I think I was either in blocks C or D and know I wasn't in A. Sean doesn't think he was in A or E. I wonder if we were all in the same block or maybe spread between a couple of them? Either way, we're planning to stay in one of the blocks again when we renew our vows at the chapel there next year or the year after. :)
After that, we found out there was even MORE to Circus Circus than we knew! We saw a sign to a KOA campground location they apparently had there and drove over to check it out! There were RV's hooked up to charging stations in a huge lot there and the areas of the lot appeared to be separated according to what kind/amount of power your RV required according to country. In the middle of all this was a gift shop with a few arcade games (no music games or highly interesting ones) in back. I think it said it was closed for the night, maybe as of 9pm or so, but we were able to peak inside through the windows. Outside and adjacent to the gift shop was the pool area, kiddie playground area, some seating, and a couple of fun quarter machine rides for kids!
We were finally getting a bit hungry and felt like we'd seen all there was to see of Circus Circus in the middle of the night so we headed in the general direction of home while deciding where to get food. We wound up at the Arizona Charlie's casino on Boulder Highway next to Boulder Station and looking around only to find that they had no dine-in restaurants at that hour and the only food you could obtain here at that hour was from a small snack bar without and seating in front. It was cool stopping in for a look though. It was Sean's first time seeing inside of any Arizona Charlie's and, I believe, my second time inside this particular location (my first being just after I moved to Vegas in '07 and stopped in every casino I passed to find out whether they had any dance games).
We had another idea after that. We thought we'd seen a sign advertising graveyard specials at Longhorn Casino, across from Eastside Cannery and just down the street from Sam's Town, awhile back. We'd never stopped in together because it didn't look like much from the outside and I couldn't remember anything special about it from the one time I'd stayed there years before. We were looking for somewhere new but inexpensive to eat though and I wanted to take Sean somewhere he hadn't been before so we decided to see what they had to offer! As soon as we got inside the tiny casino, adjacent to their much larger hotel, we were hit with an unpleasant smell we thought was probably due to a combination of years of low ceilings and cigarette smoke settling into the carpets. We made it to the back of the casino where the little cafe was, however, and were greeted by an awesome and energetic waitress who couldn't stop smiling at the sight of our sweaters. She seated us right away. We asked about the graveyard specials they had to offer there and she told us they had unlimited pancakes for $1.79, a huge plate of biscuits and gravy for $1.49, and a full breakfast (2 eggs, 2 pieces of bacon or sausage, hashbrowns or "spuds", and 2 slices of your choice of toast) for $2, I believe! WOW... Best deals we'd found so far! We were very hungry and in need of meat so we both ordered a full breakfast. I got scrambled eggs, bacon, spuds (fried potato slices with peppers and onions), and wheat toast. Sean got the wheat toast and spuds too but got his eggs sunny side up and got sausage. It was only a few minutes before our food was out. There was so much of it for the price and it all tasted great! In fact, the spuds were AMAZINGLY delicious and the bacon was, without a doubt, the most delicious I'd ever had and very juicy despite being well-cooked.
12/19/13 - New Phone (Samsung Galaxy Note 2) and the Jingle Bell Run Team Challenge:
I dropped my iPhone 4 in the toilet awhile back and hadn't gotten around to replacing it..til today! We finally made our way down to the AT&T (my service provider) store today to look at some phone options and use my upgrade to get me one. I used to be super spoiled and always had to have the latest and newest phones on TWO SEPARATE phone plans with TWO DIFFERENT service providers right when they came out (ie: I had the Sidekick 3, I believe it was, on T-Mobile and original iPhone on AT&T at the same time both right after they came out!). I've gotten a lot more practical and am much lower maintenance these days, though also not as technologically savvy. This time, I went in looking for the best deal on a user-friendly phone with a good camera, an MP3 player that lets me make playlists but didn't require that I "sync" the phone just to add songs, GPS services so I can find it if it gets misplaced, a decent notepad (for my blogger drafts), the option the add additional memory, and an easily accessible battery so I can carry a spare and switch out if need be. I wound up paying about $130 including taxes (~$44, I believe), upgrade fee ($36), and the promotional offer for the phone ($50) and ordered, since they had a web-only special that was $50 cheaper than the in-store price, a Samsung Galaxy Note 2 - this huge, flat, touch screen phone, like a cross between a tablet and a phone. They said it should show up in my mailbox within a couple of days.
Anyway, after taking care of that business, it was time for both fun and exercise! Sean and I had just searched Active.com a couple of hours earlier and had found and registered in the US Road Running Jingle Bell Run Team Challenge virtual race! We'd seen virtual races advertised online before and just started working on our own virtual race website but hadn't yet run one ourselves. It was about time!
Some info on this race:
Company: US Road Running
Race: Jingle Bell Run Team Challenge
Date/Time: Any time in December 2013
Location: Anywhere
Distance: Any
Sport: Run/Walk (Course, trail, treadmill, other race, etc)
Description from the event page: "It is the Christmas season, spread some cheer as you run.
Run your race at any location you want. You can use the treadmill, run outside, your own course, or even another race.The program is designed to encourage everyone to get out and run. This Challenge is any distance you want. Everyone in your team should run or walk the distance. You can run together or at different locations. You do not need to post your time. Only one person from your team will sign up and you must have a team name. We encourage everyone to sing up for the free option on the Get Out and Run Monthly event and post their time.
You will receive a medal for each runner. Medals will start going out on the 1st of December. The medals will not be engraved and you will not receive points towards free registration or clubs. All medals are mailed to the same address. Yes, your dog can be a team member as long as you run with him/her.
Cost: $10.00 per person (No on-line fee). You must have 2 or more to register."
Link: http://usroadrunning.com/index.php?club_id=1656
So Sean and I paid our $20 and registered as Team BBC!! Hardcore reppin. :D haha The rules of the run were extremely lax but I thought it was kind of a cool way to offer some incentive to those willing to put in a good amount of effort towards getting fit. The medal doesn't necessarily have to be one of those things to proudly show off to friends but can still be a very motivational, feel-good reminder of the hard work put in by those who are really honest with themselves and put a lot in to earning it. I don't think it has to represent a certain time or distance to be deserved. I think it's a different kind of award which, assuming you're not a loser who pays the few just to have a medal, is deserved by anyone willing to dedicate his or herself to a solid attempt towards getting or staying fit! Of course, not everyone needs reassurance or awards as motivation but I think it's wonderful to have the option.
For this event, we'd decided on an easy 5 or so mile Las Vegas Blvd ("the strip") loop from the New York New York casino up to Circus Circus and back jogging a lot and walking a bit with extra detours and breaks for food, beer/drink deals, tourist-like sight-seeing, dance games, arcades, etc. At the end of it all, however, we wound up doing closer to 12.5 miles in total over a period of about 5.5 hours!
We parked in the parking garage at NYNY a little after 9pm. Just inside the entrance to the casino from the parking garage was the arcade where NYNY's ITG2 upgrade and DDR Extreme machines are. What better way to start a workout than with some dance games? Someone had left 2 credits in the ITG machine. The pads were still really bad but who can argue with free credits, especially when you're just there for some exercise-not for scores? So Sean and I each had an ITG credit, though it was impossible to pass anything tough on the machine and we practically had to stomp to make the arrows register.
Then we shared a credit on the DDR Extreme's 1P side! I think it was Sean's 1st time trying the Extreme machine there. The inner sensors were pretty bad, especially on the left arrow, but at least it got us sweaty and tired just trying to pass songs!
We even shared a song (Sean on the up and down arrows, me on left and right) on DDR and one (Sean on left and right, me on up and down) on ITG!
We walked through the casino to get to Las Vegas Blvd and start our journey after that. We crossed the street at the first traffic light, near Coca-Cola and M&M's World, so we could jog up the eastern side of the street to the halfway point (Circus Circus) and come back down the western side where we'd finish back at NYNY. Of course, sight-seeing and time constraints on things we wanted to do and see would make us cross back and forth a bit during our adventures but for the most part we tried to stick to the eastern side while going north and western while going south.
We started jogging once we got across that 1st street. Despite how much I still struggle with running, however, what really got to me were the seemingly endless flights of stairs we had to climb to get to the walkways used to cross major streets on the strip. (When stairs are available, we don't usually use escalators or elevators these days and didn't use any during our 12.5 miles tonight.) We even did some extras on a couple of occasions just because we accidentally went the wrong way! Lol
Aside from occasional brief stops we made to get a few short videos of the sights on the way up, our 1st stop was at Casino Royale, I believe, where we spotted a sign for an awesome drink deal: $1 bottles of Michelob Ultra/Michelob Light! We stopped in and got a Michelob Light each which we took for a walk/jog with us and sipped all the way til we got to The Venetian!
Our 2nd stop was very shortly thereafter when we saw people lined up in front of the Mirage, checked the time, and realized the Mirage's volcano show was about to start! I'd been meaning to take Sean to see it since he came to visit in April 2012 but we hadn't gotten around to it. Better late than never!
When we got to The Venetian, we met and took pictures with a fellow Santa Claus who complimented us on our spirit and enthusiasm.
Then we took a little extra time to get some vids of the pretty Christmas tree and ice skating rink that'd been set up outside the Venetian for the holidays.
Aside from a few more short videos we made, our next stop was at the Peppermill restaurant near the Riviera casino. I'd passed by the place dozens of times, usually in a car but sometimes on foot, and had always been curious what it was like inside but hadn't yet taken the time to find out. I decided this was as good a time as any! We didn't spend long inside but took enough time to find that the prices were a little high but portions were big, the atmosphere seemed lively and really fun, all the staff members we encountered seemed incredibly polite and happy, they had some interesting glasses to drink from if you don't mind spending a bit on alcoholic beverages, there was a main restaurant bit as well as a separate lounge area, and we definitely want to go back for drinks and more ASAP!
Just past that was the Riviera Casino. We were STARVING by the time we got there but didn't want to take the time for dine-in food (hence why we didn't eat at Peppermill). Instead, we entered the Riviera's food court to visit the adjacent arcade but then noticed the Chinese restaurant there was closing up and had Panda Express-style take away boxes completely full of their leftover food from the day on the counter and for sale for $5! We bought one without hesitation and sat down to fill our stomachs til we had no room left! It was soo satisfying but there was so much of it we ended up with a good portion of noodles and a bit of chicken leftover. Not wanting to waste, we finally had to wrap up the remains and stick them in my backpack to take them home.
Then we had another look in the arcade for the 1st time in a long time.
In need of something other than the bottle of Tampico we'd brought in my backpack to wash the Chinese food down, we stopped by the bar next to the arcade to take advantage of the $1 beer deal: $1 for a cup of Pacific, Blue Ribbon, or Bud Light. Neither of us had tried Pacific before so we got a cup of that to share. It wasn't good but we drank it anyway. Besides, it was only $1 and it was worth it just to try something new. :)
Finally finished at Riviera, we made it across the street to our halfway point: Circus Circus! Since visiting the night before, I'd had some thoughts about Circus Circus such as how awesome it'd be if they opened a little nightclub there. We stopped in to let them know our ideas.
Then we went upstairs to see and get more info on the wedding chapel we'd be having our vow renewal at!
I'd had the iPhone's Map My Run app tracking our route since we started at NYNY but the phone's battery died while we were in Circus Circus so I think we only got the 1st half of our trip on record.
Once we'd had our fill of Circus Circus, we started our return back down to NYNY. It'd gotten pretty late and there weren't many shops, arcades, or things that'd interest us still open so we ran down to The Quad casino without stopping except to get a couple of pics we couldn't resist taking and vids to show our progress and the sights we saw (ie: the ships outside Treasure Island).
At The Quad, we had a gaming and massage break! We made our way to their 24 hour arcade, rejuvenated in their $1 massage chairs, and played a game each on the AVT Track Quads on Amazon racing game they had there. Coincidence that they had that game? Lol
Sean's phone battery died while we were gaming at The Quad so we weren't able to get any more pics or vids til we got back to our car at NYNY. We'd explored pretty much everything we wanted to though so we ran nearly the whole way back aside from one brief stop to rearrange, a couple sets of stairs we played on, and a few moments when we jumped over things and took a pic for some tourists.
Back at the car in the NYNY parking garage at 2:55am, we charged Sean's phone while stretching our bodies out a bit. Then we went back into the casino to reward ourselves with $3 Jell-O shots at the bar! Sean hadn't had a Jell-O shot before and I'd only had one once so we got one each - red for me, blue for him - and tried to work out how to slurp them down. XD They were small and didn't have much alcohol in them but at least they were yummy (probably because there was so much more gelatin than alcohol in them).
I guess it was a good thing the Jell-O shots were so weak because after that we wrapped our night up by doing a few more stretches by the car and driving home! We were pretty sore but had had a really good time and gotten a lot of good pics, vids, and exercise!
For a more graphic look at our night, visit our YouTube channels and look up our US Road Running Jingle Bell Team Challenge virtual run vid!
12/21/13 - Come Run With Santa 5k Run & 1 Mile Walk (plus Xmas activities later!)
While searching Active.com for upcoming races just over a week ago, Sean and I came across one called the Come Run With Santa 5k Run & 1 Mile Walk. We checked it out and were a little disappointed to find that there were no medals provided for race finishers at this particular event. (Not a big deal but we enjoy collecting them.) On the bright side, however, registration was only $28 per person at the time and included long sleeve shirts for each runner - something I'd never seen from a running event before. Also, there were prizes for overall as well as age division winners of the 5k race. We decided to give it a shot!
The race info:
Race: Come Run With Santa
Location:
Findlay Chevrolet
6800 S Torrey Pines Dr.
Las Vegas, NV 89118
(I-215 & South Rainbow area)
Start time: 7:00am - December 21, 2013
Race flyer: http://www.lasvegasrunningteam.com/Flyers/2013/Comerunwithsanta.pdf
It was the 15th annual Come Run With Santa race hosted by the Las Vegas Running Team and sponsored by Findlay Chevrolet and others.
Anyway, race day came around and Sean's and my schedules were so screwed up that we didn't end up sleeping the night before and didn't start getting ready til it was nearly time to leave! We were such a mess. We hadn't had much time to look at the location of the race either and didn't realize it was clear across town. x.x We finally looked up directions AFTER hopping on the freeway but by then we were already running late. We drove as fast as we could get away with and finally made it to the race almost on time!
Everyone else was hanging out near the start line and warming up when we arrived. I didn't blame them. It was so cold outside! We still had to get our race bibs though. We ran inside the dealership to where race day packet pick up was and got out bibs and long sleeve shirts. They couldn't hold the shirts for us til we were done with the race so Sean had to run them back to the car for us. Finally, we started making our way down to the start line.
The race had already started but we thought it wouldn't matter much since our race bibs had timing chips in them. Sadly, we were wrong. Once we got to the start line and saw everyone else running off into the distance, we were told that the race times (and accordingly prizes) were based off of gun time. They were only timing how long it took people to get back to the finish line from the time the gun went off-not from the time they crossed the start line. Crap!! We were about 2 minutes late and sooo not ready but we took off anyway. We wished each other good luck, put our game faces on, and got our music going. A minute later, Sean disappeared into the distance, passing everyone in sight. I couldn't keep up, of course, but I was doing my own thing and overtaking dozens of people too. We both ran hard and fast (or at least as fast we we could manage), giving it just about everything we had. It wasn't long before my toes started to go numb from the cold and my fingers followed but not quite as badly. It didn't slow me down at all though. I kept on at the fastest pace I could stay conscious at, slowing down when I couldn't get enough air and felt everything going black and speeding up as soon as I thought it was safe to do so without passing out. As usual when I run for more than a few minutes, I started to get tunnel vision really early on and had to adjust my pace to keep my legs from running away from me and to keep from fainting. (I haven't worked out a good breathing method yet and never seem to be able to get enough oxygen when I run, though my legs are usually fine.) Fortunately, it was pretty easy for me to get a feel of how much distance I had left on this course and conserve accordingly.
The 5k course went around the dealership twice, then east on the stretch of road in front of it for a bit, turned around to head west back down that stretch of road, and then completed one last lap around the dealership in the opposite direction from the first two to hit the finish line (same as the start line). The 1 mile marker came around at the start of the second lap around the dealership. The 2 mile marker was by the turn around point on the stretch of road in front of the dealership. Just a few minutes before getting to the turn around, I saw Sean heading back from it and we blew each other kisses. ^.^ He'd passed up a good majority of the people in the race. I'd passed a lot of them too but was still way behind Sean. When I reached the finish line, we was waiting there for me. I collapsed on the ground to catch my breath, finally getting up to find that we'd both come 2nd in our age groups despite starting the race late! Not bad! I'm pretty sure I'd gotten my best time too but there was no way to be completely sure just what that time was since they based the whole race on gun time-not actual time.
Another funny and noteworthy thing about the race was that it took place right next to the dealership I bought my Mustang from and at the end of the race we received flyers for a Mustang 50th anniversary race that'd be held in April 2014. Obviously we had to do it!
Since it was Christmas time and things were so busy, it was hard to keep track of the dates of each of the following but here are a few more December events that I remember.
-Sean's dad and pat sent us $100 in an Xmas card. Thank you SO MUCH!!
-It took us awhile but we finally put our Xmas tree up and decorated it.
-One night, Sean finished Super Mario 3 while I typed most of this up.
-We had a nice night roadting nuts by fire while drinking tasty cocoa and shandy
-We cooked up some delicious green bean casserole and mince pies. Yum!
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