Geekin’ it up in Sin City

My room here on the 22nd floor of the Hilton overlooks the city (last time I was in Vegas my room was on the other side and overlooked the golf course, boo). Thanks to the wonders of modern computer and cell phone technology, I’m sitting at a sort of desk at the window (a marble counter that runs along the window), editing and uploading photos and updating my blog from the comfort of my hotel room. It looks like Sloanie.com is back with a vengeance… There should be lots of opportunities to take pics of random things throughout the week.

Though I’m starting to understand why people gamble (man what’s that Idaho lottery at now, about $250 million?), it’s still not something that interests me. As Melissa and I were eating dinner at a café in the hotel, this talkative (and probably lonely) guy in his 50s or something started talking to us. He was here for another convention, but mentioned that if you can afford to lose the money it’s called “gaming”, and that if you can’t afford to lose it it’s a “gamble”… heheh. I still scratch my head at this part of town where the entire culture is based on spectacle and entertainment, especially gambling, scantily or unclad women, and everything else that goes along with those things. Though I feel like I’m in the great and spacious building, it is good to know that it is only the strip and this part of Vegas that is based on such a lack of moral values. I have to say though, a lot of the random people I’ve met here, who are here to gamble, have been very friendly, though once I hit the streets I’m sure I’ll see plenty of trash 😉

This guy that started talking to Melissa and I at dinner was funny. He told us about how bumpy the landing was (mine was too) coming into Vegas. Pockets of rising hot air from the deseret landscape would give the plane some pretty good bumps. He said on his flight, to get the plane to land, the pilot at some point just killed the engine and let the plane drop a number of feet. It touched down so hard, he said, that all the oxygen masks came flying down out of their holders. Crazy, huh? He said that the people then proceeded to rush, practically run to get off the plane… he figured perhaps they were scared from the rough landing. To his amazement, when he got off the plane, he found that their hurry was not one of panic but one of greed—they were pulling slots and just couldn’t wait to start gambling! Hehehe…