We didn’t really have any plans laid out while we were downtown besides a nice dinner at The Flame Steakhouse in El Cortez at 6:30pm today. We did a little bit of gambling and walking around on Fremont, but didn’t really win anything.For brunch, we decided to go to Mandalay Bay at the Border Grill to meet up with another couple that hadn’t come downtown to hang out yet. When we got there, they mentioned that they weren’t serving brunch anymore because they couldn’t keep up with the orders. Well, I should have known that the MyVegas Facebook group was there that day, because they planned a meet around the time we were visiting, and there’s a free brunch reward for the Border Grill on the MyVegas Facebook app game. The couple that we met up with had the reward, so the waiters made an exception for them, but I didn’t get it so I didn’t want to spend $30 on the meal plus whatever for a drink. I stuck with a grilled caliente chicken torte. Let’s just say I wasn’t very satisfied with it, but it filled the tummy and will definitely make a turd.

So after we ate, the 2 other couples decided they were going to go check out Shark Reef, but the night before we had already said we would go with the other 2 couples and decided to wait it out as we had free passes too.

We walked around Mandalay Bay to get a feel for the hotel since we would be moving our stuff and staying there on Monday. We gambled a little bit, but I wasn’t having very good luck, especially with the machines that I normally like to play which are the double diamond deluxe .25 machines. After walking around and losing a little bit of money we decided we had enough and wanted to get back downtown. I was so full and just wanted to go take a nap or do a little gambling downtown again.

We head to the El Cortez since that’s our favorite spot to lose a little money. I wasn’t having luck there either, what is this shit? Supposed to have the loosest slots in Vegas and I’m not even winning a 1.00. We go back to our hotel and try to make plans with the others. They asked what we were doing for dinner, so we mentioned the Flame Steakhouse and so they all wanted to go. It took about 3 calls before the hostess there got our reservations correct with the right amount of people we specified. Plus, we bumped dinner up to 8 pm since we were completely stuffed from earlier this afternoon. That’s the bad thing about Vegas. You can eat one meal and be completely stuffed, because you’re drinking, walking, and retaining water so you feel bloated most of the time. We probably ate 2 meals a day because of this.

We arrive at the steakhouse and the hostess can’t find our reservations. WHAT!? We called like 3 times to make sure they were correct and now they’re no where to be found? Wow, they need to rehire some new staff, preferably not foreigners. Now we have to wait about a half an hour for them to set our table up and get us seated, so we went next door to the new bar they have. I didn’t order anything because they didn’t have any spiced or cherry rum. How do you  not have any flavored rum? It’s supposed to be a bar, pfft.

Finally our table is ready and I wanted something light, so I ordered the grilled salmon with asparagus because my appetite even at 8:30 pm was not huge. We also got a bottle of Riesling since I had a $25 off coupon from my American Casino Guide Coupon Book, which was plenty enough for my husband and I to have a glass and a half each with our meal. Once we were finished up at dinner, we decided to go hang out at the casino until we figured out what we were doing with the rest of our evening. I sat by my friend at one of the slot machines. She’s a newbie at gambling with slots, so it was kind of amusing seeing her bet the most minimum you could bet on a penny slot. Both her and her husband are cheap, so I knew she’d probably be focused on the penny slots. But, you can’t win if you bet 1 penny x 1 line. That’s betting 1 cent. You’re pretty much just going to waste your time and money, but if pushing the button or pulling the handle is what you enjoy, then I guess you’re set. Anyways, a drink staff member comes by and yells drinks, anyone want drinks. And of course I say yes. But then she looks at my machine and says are you going to play. I said yeah. I don’t need someone to tell me I need to gamble in order to get a drink, especially when you get a tip lady. She pretty much just ruined her chances of getting a tip. When I was at Mandalay Bay, I was sitting at a machine without gambling and a lady asked if I wanted a drink, so I know they don’t care if you gamble since you’re in the casino and have probably gambled at some point.

Even though she pretty much told me I needed to gamble to get a drink, I decided to put a $5 bill in the penny machine next to my friend. I bet the most amount of lines which I think was 30, then x1 or x2, which is either .30 or .60 cents a pull. Since I am not lucky with penny machines, I tend to avoid them, but it was actually paying off a little bit to sit there and play this machine. I got the bonus a few times, which resulted in small wins, but at least I walked away with $40 instead of $5. And the lady never got a tip from me when she brought my drink to me. That’ll teach her to tell me I need to gamble. I’ll walk away with money and not share any.

After that, we all decided to head back to our room at the D and chill a bit with some drinks. After about midnight, the other 2 couples decide to head back to their room and call it a night at the Excalibur. I heard a really good metal guy outside singing, so I wanted to go back down there, but didn’t get the others to get off their butts until 1 am when they stop all the concert shows. I guess I could have went down there by myself, but it’s a scary place down there when you’re alone. So I decided to gamble some upstairs at the D where the coin machines are that actually pay you in coins and not tickets. That’s old school yo! I was actually having a bit of luck on the haywire machines and at around 3am, I decided I am way too tired to be up this late, when we just stayed up til 5am the previous night. So I headed to bed, while thee husband stayed upstairs and gambled some more. Might seem crazy, but we enjoy it. I actually made out more than I had put in, which was only $20. I was pretty much just trying every machine I could to try and get rid of the coins I had so I wouldn’t have to go downstairs, but that didn’t work since I kept getting more out. lol

Call me weird, I know.

I at least was up for the day and probably for the entire trip that time. I usually don’t put much in at a time, and that seems to work best for me, at least so far.

Until next time.

Even though I’ve flown to Vegas 4 times now, this being my 4th, I am never fully prepared for the plane ride. It gives me major anxiety to where I need to shit a few times throughout the day. Maybe a little TMI?Anyways, we set out the door to head to my moms so she can take our car back home with her so we wouldn’t have to pay ridiculous parking fees for 5 days. We arrive at the airport, pick up our boarding passes and drop off our bags. Head to the security area and take off everything required upon entering their body scan machine. Some new thing they’re doing now, which makes me a bit nervous and creeped out because they can see your private parts. They say they are being removed by the TSA, but why are they still in Portland and Vegas airports?

Once we arrive in Vegas, we hop on the shuttle transport to pick up our car at Enterprise. This was kind of a breeze since we used the kiosk instead of waiting in the line for a half an hour. Although, they seemed to add on some more taxes and shit that weren’t included in our reservation prices. One thing I hate about Vegas is they nickle and dime you for EVERYTHING.

Now’s the time to pick up some booze at Walmart. Yes, Walmart of all places since it’s the cheapest booze place in town. We discovered that on our first trip since most drinks are $10+, even for wells, and you can get a $10 fifth at Walmart and some solo cups and walk around with your own booze. Bad thing is, you have to head to your room every time you want another drink though. But when you’re staying downtown, it’s not too bad. However, on the strip is another story since each hotel is miles and miles long, so you kind of have to get a drink in between trips back to your room.

We always grab a fifth of spiced rum, regular rum (since there’s a million places for slushy drinks and that’s what they mainly use [we bring flasks for this very reason]) and vodka for our 2 night stay downtown at the D.

We start heading downtown because there’s this Mexican place that was really good and inexpensive right across from El Cortez that a friend likes since we were all starving for food. Unfortunately when we got down there, we noticed that it was out of business. So then we park our cars and start walking down Fremont to find food. Normally we go to the place with the big beer mug outside for breakfast, but their service and food has gone down hill since the first time we ate there and so we tried to avoid that place, but then I was like well we can go to the place next door which was a fish house. I think they are owned and operated by the same people because the service and food was subpar still.

A couple of our friends head back to the airport around 9pm to pick up our friends that had to be fashionably late and check them in and hang out until around midnight on the strip where they were staying. After that, they head back downtown to chill with us some.  So there’s 8 of us hanging out in our room, listening to music, drinking booze, and around 2:30, 3:00 am we decided that we were hungry so we start walking down fremont which BTW is dead at that time. You won’t find the strip dead, but maybe that’s a good thing? We end up going into the Fremont hotel and find this 3.99 cafe for the Duece Breakfast, which features 2 pieces of bacon, 2 pieces of sausage, 2 eggs and hash browns. Not bad for the price when there’s nothing else opened!

Once we finished, we were all pretty tired and warn out for our first day, so we decided to head back to our hotels and pass the eff out.

Until the next day.