 Vegas June 2019 (WSOP) |
| Days 17-19 - Random stuff |
| Last Updated: 2019-06-23 10:15:27 |
| (Updated Sunday morning...scroll down...)
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| On day 17 we ate, shopped, ate, played a slot and went to bed. As promised, no poker.
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| Lunch at the Bacchanal Buffet at Caesar's. Nowadays I would say the best buffet on the strip. They actually do some different things it seems every time we go there. But ... pricey! You get what you pay for.
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| There is a bit of an irony to that in my mind, only because as I think back to when we seemingly had every meal at a buffet it was Caesar's that IMHO started the trend of "everything the same". We would get the 24 hour pass for any Caesar's owned casino (timed to get a late dinner at the start and an early dinner at the end) and we'd eat at 3-4 different ones. And it was cool, you could have a lot of different foods. Especially if you hit Rio (which was the largest selection back in the day) and Paris, which would be completely different.
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| But then they started to morph into where we could go to 3-4 Caesar's property buffets and have a lot of the same stuff and only a couple of different things. They basically all became the same, all the way down to the breads and the desserts (tho the "all cupcake" dessert at Spice Market in Planet Hollywood was cool and different, wonder if they still do that...). And the quality went downhill with the variety. More food left out too long, cheaper stuff, etc.
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| At that time all the ones in the MGM resorts were the ones with variety. Bellagio was definitely a class above them all in terms of food quality and variety.
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| Not so much any more. They've all reduced options, they're all pretty generic. It's a shame, but (very minor somewhat political statement) this is what happens when two massive corporations effectively own the strip between them. These aren't 20 or so hotels competing against each other and trying to stand out, it's two massive companies trying to do just enough to make their customers come back and squeeze out as much profit as they can.
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| You can clearly track the downhill slide of the Las Vegas strip buffets to the corporate consolidation on the strip. That's what happens when real competition goes away and two companies are just making sure they get their slice of the pie. It didn't happen overnight, it occurred over years, but I watched it happen...
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| Shopping at the Fashion Show Mall, I finally bought a new laptop bag! The one I have is falling apart, because even when I'm not carrying a laptop back and forth to work (which is almost never) or travelling with the laptop (which is every time I travel) it serves as my de facto briefcase so it sees a lot of use and abuse. Definitely spent more than I ever did before, thing better outlast me!
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| For dinner we decided to try LaLa Noodle at Park MGM. I didn't have a noodle dish, but I'll say this - we may have just found a replacement for Noodle Asia at Venetian (one less penny in Adelson's pocket every trip!). Liked the food as much if not better; way, way more convenient for where we stay; an MGM resort (obviously) so counts to our point total. Now that we're platinum we gotta maintain it!
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| Did spend a couple more bucks but really only a little more.
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| Gelato at Eataly, some slots (Joann is ahead for the trip!!!! Unlike some of us...) and we called it a night.
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| One final note:
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| Having been to Italy only a little over a month ago, we're beyond impressed with the Venetian's exterior and Eataly in Park MGM.
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| The people who built the Venetian nailed it! St Mark's Square in Vegas! Right down to the replica of the 24 hour clock in the corner of the actual square. Obviously a little rearranging but the Rialto Bridge replica is spot on as well. If you ever want to know what Venice looks like without having to go there take a good look at the Venetian.
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| And walking around Eataly is like poking your head into restaurants around cities in Italy. Way, way more expensive (a 2-4 Euro sandwich in Italy is a 12-14 dollar sandwich at Eataly), but they've seriously got it down. Sandwiches pre-made and stacked in a glass case to grab and go, pasta made right in front of you (made as in from scratch, not just cooked), etc. And the Gelato stand as good as any you'd find in country (and served packed in the cup like they do over there, not just one scoop stacked on the other).
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| Much more impressed with both of them now that I've seen the real thing.
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| That's all I got for Day 17. No promises but there may be more tomorrow...
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| =========================================================
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| Like Dave, apparently I should consider sticking with craps and giving up poker... :-)
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| Joann and I were thinking about trying an Italian place at Aria called Carbone. Since some of the nicer restaurants have dress codes we popped in the door on Friday to see if I (who brought only shorts, no pants) would be appropriately dressed. Answer was yes, and if we really wanted to eat there we should get a reservation. First time I was ever told that the only way we'd get to eat somewhere was if we had one or if we showed up and someone happened to cancel theirs!
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| So that night we checked and the only slots they had were 10:15 and 10:30. We had no intention of waiting until that late for dinner...
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| But the next morning we're sitting at the pool talking about what else we might do, I checked the app again and lo and behold two time slots! 7:00 it is!
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| Lunch at In-N-Out, a quick run to our favorite liquor store one more time to get something they don't carry in the Denver location according to the app, gas up at Sam's Club and back to the room to watch some streaming and wait for dinner.
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| I talked about Eataly above. One thing I didn't mention was that they have a small Italian supermarket intertwined with the food counters, which includes Italian wines and liquors.
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| They had this bottle of lemon infused gin from an Italian spirits company. They actually had 3 varieties from the distiller, but since I love my gin and tonics with a lemon slice instead of lime you can imagine I was intrigued by this! (Tangueray makes a lime infused one that's very good, BTW, called Rangpur). But $53-54 for a 750ml bottle seemed awfully pricey to me!
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| Enter Total Wine. Same bottle $27.99, in stock in the two stores I checked here but not at the Denver location.
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| Sold!
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| Oh almost forgot. While waiting for dinner, M-Life has several different kinds of "points" you can earn. Some are just "tier credits" for status, some are points you can only use to shop in a 2 week-ish period around the holidays, some are comps, and some (which we had a sizeable pile of) can be converted to comps. We actually got $355 towards our stay at the M-Life desk!
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| On the way back to the room we played a little slots and for the first time I think in years I stepped up to a craps table. Slots didn't go great, but well enough that Joann milked a single $100 bill in quarter machines over the whole two weeks and will take that bill and some change home with her!
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| Was doing ok at the craps table, up a little, until the dice got passed to me. Got on a helluva roll, hit every "hard way" I bet (after telling Joann before we walked over I was going to avoid those to limit the damage...) and walked away almost $500 richer.
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| Note to Dave - I did think about dropping $5 on "all high", which I almost accomplished! I hit every high number as a point or a come bet more than once (especially 9, rolled a lot of 9s...) and threw an 11. Joann kept telling me to bet 12 but I didn't and I think it's the only one I never rolled...
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| Dinner at Carbone was very good. Really enjoyed the pasta, the bread at the table was great. Even enjoyed the minestrone soup even although it wasn't tomato-based broth. It was green broth (no idea what it the base was, but it was very thin, not pea soup). I did have one minestrone in Italy that wasn't tomato based, Joann thinks in Florence but I think in Rome. Even served us a bottle of limoncello at the end. Two double-shot glasses and an entire large bottle placed in the center of our table. There wasn't a lot left when we eventually walked out of the restaurant...
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| But, again, reminders of our trip to Italy! We ate at more than one restaurant that finished our meal with a free shot of limoncello while we were over there and it didn't occur to either of us they'd bring us one here!
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| For those who read the entry for Omaha 8/b at Aria, Ari Engel won his first WSOP bracelet Saturday. Good for him, seemed like a really nice kid.
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| It's finally time to head home! Joann and I did the math, we've been away from home for 33 of the last 54 days!
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| I think we're both a bit worn out. Not in any hurry to get back to work of course, but it will be nice to return to "normalcy" again for a while.
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| OK so this is really it unless something wacky happens on our drive home. You know, like a snow storm in the mountains just a day or two after the start of summer.
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| As if that could ever happen...
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| (those links are not the same...) |
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