Back from Vegas

What a trip!! We had a blast in Vegas blowing off some steam left over from Phase 1 of our project == and I'm glad we did it Wed-Friday, since I know I need the weekend to rest and be ready for work again. Here's the lowdown on what went down....

Wed we hooked up at the airport [Ian, SK, Jeff and I] for the flight to Vegas -- hung out with some cool people on the plane and had a bloody mary to kick the trip off. Once we got to Vegas, I had several calls from FSMB, Mike and Hung trying to get in touch with us -- something had wacked out our application and no one could get it to return any data. Long story short, client didn't follow the procedure for starting / stopping the database, and it hosed our connection. All was well within 30 min... We took a limo from the airport into town and took care of most of it in the car (and in style!)

Wed afternoon we hung around the pool at the Hard Rock -- Hung had arranged for cabanas each day, and Wed was Hard Rock day. I think that's the best pool I've ever been to. The bottom of the pool had really nice gravely sand and felt wonderful. Basically, there were 2 large lagoons connected by a lazy river that wrapped around the bar / blackjack area, and went under a 20' waterfall. They even had a water slide!!

We played there until we were done in the sun for the day (had lunch at The Pink Taco in the hotel) and eventually made our way over to Mandalay Bay to rest before dinner. That night we basically just walked around the Luxor / Mandalay Bay area before catching up with the rest of the group over at Red Square for a couple of vodkas and then next door to Rum Jungle for dinner and dancing. Worst meal I've ever had in Vegas -- food was cold, service shitty, steak tough. Hated to say it, but that's the way it goes.

We took off for the table games after that, and by the time 4:30 the next morning rolled around, I had certainly had my share for the day. [Jeff, Mike and I were the late-nighters that night] Thursday I basically recovered by sleeping late, then napping at the pool at Mandalay's main beach. Thursday night we headed over to Simon Kitchen at the Hard Rock for dinner -- much better meal!! Frankly, it's one of my favorite restaurants, and they didn't disappoint. That evening we played at Hard Rock for a while -- I lost one too many hands to the blackjack dealer and called it an evening about 11:00.

Mike and the guys would have none of that, though. By midnight, they had me back out at the casino at Mandalay. I played for about another hour and listened to a band playing a lounge nearby, then turned in -- Mike and SK were the late-night guys that night.

Friday was all about doing the things we didn't get to do the other two days. We did breakfast buffet at Alladin, then hit their mall for some shopping. I lounged at the cabana for a while at the newly opened South Lagoon at Mandalay and then took a stroll through Shark Reef. Played a bit more blackjack to lessen my losses -- ended up not too bad. Then it was off to the airport around 5. Flight was a bit delayed, but we still touched down in Houston just about 12:30 am.

Nice way to treat the team to a little R/R --