Trip to the airport was pretty standard... bumpy flight, though. Oh, and I've totally given up on the United "snack box" options they sell on the planes. They keep slightly changing them around and taking away the good stuff.
The ride from the airport to the Flamingo... our cab driver was a HOOT. It was non-stop, old-time jokes the entire way (some more than insulting, but hey, oldies are goodies sometimes). The man was tipped generously for the entertainment. We checked the bags and then headed over to the new Hash House A GoGo at the Imperial Palace.
The wait wasn't too terrible (but the whole weekend was pretty dead). I pretty much knew I had to try the chicken & waffles, and the hubby ordered their basic breakfast combo that included a pancake.
And what a pancake!
My chicken and waffles was equally stunning....
After the food, we headed back to the Flamingo and gambled a bit, and then waited for check-in. After the last trip where we were trapped in our room for two days expelling all food from our bodies, we apparently lost our Platinum status so we had to stand in line with the rest of the schmucks for check in. And for some reason, the lines were LONG every time we went past, so we had to wait it out.
The was one clerk that was training someone new, and the hubby spent the time in line going "Please, not the one training the new girl...." so of course, we got that clerk. Who explained the process to the new girl and although the hubby had a twenty very visibly in hand, the clerk didn't even ask us about any type of upgrade to the room (usually they ask if you want strip side for blah blah more a night) and just handed us keys. Um, Flamingo... are we on your shit list??
Went to find the room... 27th floor, facing the pool area. Oh well. With the shape that horrible Donnie & Marie clingly thing on the front of the hotel is in, those windows are probably dirty as heck.
Hung out in the room for a little, and then decided to go check out City Center and get some Pinks for dinner.
City Center was a "meh" for me. It really is like they had whoever did the decor in the place watch Oceans 13 and said "Make it look like THAT". Checked out the menu for the Todd English PUB place... mildly interesting. Although the hubby was deeply offended at the idea of cheese on a grilled bologna sandwich.
Dinner at Pinks... we got what we got last time... a Strip Dog for the man (two dogs, chili, guac, cheese and other fixings) and a Showgirl Dog for me (saurkraut, tomatoes, bacon and sour cream on a single dog) and tried their onion rings....
At least this time I got smart and used the little tray the hot dog is in to try and eat.... I just kinda shoved the dog over the edge to take a bite rather than pick up the hotdog. Worked okay. The hubby resorted to a knife & fork about halfway thru his dog. And the onion rings were darned good.
Gambling at the Flamingo was actually good to me on Thursday... playing video poker, the machines seemed to be very kind with 4 and 5 of a kinds on Dueces Wild, and even a few Royal flushes with deuces. For the first time EVER at the Flamingo, the machines were playing like the WinPoker software I've used to learn how I should be playing. It was kinda nice.
On Friday, we decided to head over to the sports book at the Palazzo in an attempt to try and catch the Sox/Cubs game after we had no success trying to find a channel that had the Blackhawks victory celebration that was happening in Chicago (I swear... it wasn't on our TV even though an old lady from Minnesota who was also staying at the Flamingo was telling us about it later that day). The whole town was pretty World Cup mad, but before we left the hotel room I even said "It's only ONE game on at a time... they can't have EVERY screen on the World Cup."
Oh yeah. Yes they can.
We did find one team that had some of the baseball pre-game, but we couldn't find a single person working there who would either stop as they passed us or would come over when we tried to gesture to them to figure out if we could just have a seat or what... sorry, Emeril... we wanted to eat there but we don't like places where you have to try that hard to spend your money. We left.
Walked around the Fashion Show mall for a little, and at the sports store we actually caught the guy unpacking the world champs Blackhawks shirts... the hubby bought one.
Head back to the shops at Ceasars and went to the little La Cantina or whatever it is Mexican place, and settled for watching the World Cup while I checked for Sox updates on my phone. We got the "salsa flight" and the hubby had their tacos al pastor (VERY good) and I had a tequila grilled chicken salad (also very yummy).
Oh yeah... the picture of my salad was one that was lost because the SD card on my phone freaked out. Thanks to the lovely Art Plus Digital Photo Recovery tool I was able to get most of them back. Yay!
After that, we headed back to the room to watch the end of the Sox/Cubs game. I was quite amused when the ad on the thing behind the banner rolled to "Visit Las Vegas". I am easily amused.
After that, some more gambling before we figured out we were "mildly hungry". We toyed with the idea of going back to the Todd English place, but neither of us wanted to walk that far. So, we decided to try the new Burger Joint at the Flamingo. Same place as the last tapas place and I think an old Italian place... right near the enterance to the Wildlife habitat.
We split an order of potato skins (tres good) and their slider trio.
(Slider Trip picture half deleted by my phone... grrrr....)
Good service, food was decent enough, and they currently have a special for a $2 burger and fries after midnight (which would be AWESOME if you were looking for something to soak up some booze). We'll visit that place again. Even if they can no longer afford the hostesses with the fake boobs that were always outside the tapas place.
More night time gambling... again, was doing not horribly at the video poker machines. We did eventually retire to the outside bar to people watch and have some cheap beers ($2 drafts).
And we even got to see a couple of cops in ACTION!
Saturday we did the usual room service breakfast thing....
.... and then more gambling. On Saturday the video poker machines turned on me... no longer reliable for a bit of play off $20... they started sucking in my money like I was paying the air conditioning bill.
For dinner... it was off to our "romantic" dinner spot.... Fatburger. Hey, we had it after we got married, and we never made it there on our last trip, so we were overdue.
I got a medium burger, the hubby got a large, and we split some chili cheese fries...
Always good.
After that, it was back to the hotel to do the prelim packup before heading back down to the casino for the last round of gambling.
And lord... did the poker machines NOT like me at that point. And it doesn't help that the video poker area on a Saturday is always overrun by people waiting for seats in the poker room that just sit at a machine and put in $20 when they want a drink.
So.. I headed over to the slots near the Total Rewards desk, and tried out the space Monopoly game.
And promptly got two bonuses in a row and was up to $100. Awesome! And man, the bonus stuff was fun.
After that, I sat at one of the video poker machines in the area, and found it to be MUCH kinder (even though the payouts were worse). Sat and played until the hubby came to fetch me. And then I made him have a go at the Monopoly machine and he also came out a winner.
Packed up, went to sleep, woke up the next morning and headed back to the airport.
Oh, at the airport I did pick up a chicken wrap from Burke In The Box to eat on the plane... not horrible, but not enough chicken for my tastes. And although it was $9, that is what they charge for the food on planes now.
Flight back was uneventful.
All considered... a good trip. Not the most profitable (we did leave money there, but we didn't come back broke) and not the fanciest... but having an uneventful trip was still kinda nice.
