here today, gone tomorrow

So much for going back to Bay Meadows next year. It appears they'll be closing down in November, after 73 years of racing.

night at the racetrack

A friend invited a bunch of us to go to Bay Meadows with her tonight, because there was a special: $1 admission, $1 beer, $1 hot dogs, and $1 minimum bets. Plus, Tainted Love, one of my favorite 80's cover bands, was playing between races.

In the end, I spent $7, ate a hot dog, was entertained for three hours, and learned a lot about betting on horses. Now I know what it means to "win, place, or show", what a "quinella" is versus an "exacta", and how the odds are read off of the scoreboard.

Here are a few somewhat blurry photos (horses are fast!):

Vegas highlights

I got back yesterday from yet another sleep-deprived, smoke-filled Vegas trip.

This time, I did head back to the Fashion Outlets in Primm this time, and had a productive shopping day.

On the food side of things, I finally got to try Bouchon Las Vegas, where I had a yummy bucket of mussels, accompanied by French fries. I topped that off with a plate of cheese; I've forgotten the other two (one was sheep's milk, one was cow's milk) but my favorite was the Garotin, which is a fairly mild, soft cheese made of goat's milk.

The next night, we ate at Rosemary's Restaurant, which is a good 15 minutes off the Strip, but is well worth the drive. I had a $49 prix fixe, with a parmesan souffle and wild mushroom ragout appetizer, roasted rack of lamb entree (+$10 surcharge), and a chocolate bread pudding, espresso ice cream, and vanilla creme anglaise dessert. All three of the dishes were extremely good; I felt the souffle was the most creative, and the lamb had no aftertaste at all (like New Zealand lamb), but I enjoyed the dessert the most. We were also treated to a savory bread pudding amuse, and homemade sweets after dessert.

I was finally able to eat again the next day at around 1:30pm, and at that time we headed to the Paris Sunday brunch. It was $25 per person, and well worth it. My favorite dishes were the puff pastry with the chicken stew inside, the king crab (of course), and the chocolate tart dessert.

The non-food activities mostly involved drinking and gambling. On the first night, we went to Caramel, a lounge inside of the Bellagio, and had lots of expensive drinks. I think I spent over $100 buying a round of Lemondrops for six people. Afterwards, we were fairly tipsy, and managed to entertain ourselves playing nickel slots for a couple of hours before heading off to bed.

The next night, I actually meant to get a decent amount of sleep, but three of my friends entered a poker tournament starting at 11pm, and after three hours, two were still in it, so of course I had to stay and watch. On the bright side, one of them finished third in the tournament, making a couple hundred dollars. On the other hand, the tournament finished at a quarter past 4am, so I didn't get to sleep until sometime after 5am.

Right before we left for the airport, one person (who had lost a lot of money over the last few days) decided on a whim to put some money on roulette. He walked up to the nearest table, and put $20 on 24, and $20 on 28. He wasn't watching the wheel, but several of us were, and we were completely stunned when the ball hopped in and out of 0 and landed on 28, netting him $720. It was a great way to leave.

yearly Vegas pilgrimage

Just got back from Vegas after three days of gambling, shopping, eating, and other random fun things.

This time around I finally saw "O" by Cirque du Soleil, which I had been resisting because of the ridiculous price tag ($125 for rear orchestra). I grudgingly admit it's worth the price of admission, if only because of the coolness of the special effects.

I'm mostly awake today, but I'm feeling a kind of tiredness that is unrelated to sleep deprivation (I slept for 10+ hours when I got back) or physical activity (unless walking around outlet malls counts as exercise). I plan on much television-watching and book-reading this week.

weekend in Vegas

When I was booking my plane tickets, it seemed like a good idea to fly to Vegas on a Friday night, stay three nights, and fly back at 5am on Monday morning in time to attend an 11am meeting with an Engineering VP. No, I wasn't smoking anything at the time. I think I still subconsciously have the delusion that if I try hard enough, I can sleep 5 hours a night and function properly, like I did in college. Then again, I don't remember certain college years all that clearly.

This post was written after a weekend of:

- 20+ hours of gambling (up at most $165, down at most $80, net profit $145...take that, Vegas!)
- 1 food coma inducing all-you-can-eat Brazilian BBQ dinner
- 1 Bellagio champagne brunch
- 6-7 hours of being glued to the sports betting section watching opening weekend football
- 6 hours, 6 hours, and 5 hours of sleep, consecutively, plus a 1 hour nap this morning

I still have a 9pm ice hockey game to play tonight. I guess we'll see how far pure adrenaline can go.