Las Vegas - Day 1

Thursday November 8 2007

What a crazy day! Crystal and I left home at 1:30 this afternoon to head for our flight to Las Vegas via the Sea Tac airport in Seattle. We had a few errand stops along the way and traffic was very heavy through downtown Seattle and arrived at the airport around 6 pm.

As we walked through the terminal to our gate for our 8 pm flight, Crystal noticed another Southwest flight boarding and stopped to ask if there was room on the plane for us. The ticketing agent said their policy is to not make changes on our type of flight (the cheap seats) BUT, since the fog was rolling in and there happened to be a few extra seats she’d make an exception. YES!

We boarded the flight, pleased to know we’d arrive 3 1/2 hours early and not have a stop in Reno. Our luggage wouldn’t arrive with us, but we planned to pick it up later. The flight was smooth, the beer was cold and I discovered Ritz Crackers makes chips - how smart is that? You know how they cut Ritz crackers in nice little circles - what do you think happens to the left over dough? Someone at Ritz decided to make chips out it - and 6 bags of them are yummy for dinner!

I sat by a very interesting young man from Seattle and we talked most of the trip. He said he had been in Iraq and Afghanistan so I assumed he was military. I asked him about the Afghanistan outdoor markets and the temperatures. He said how beautiful the mountainous regions of Afghanistan are as they are the base of the Himalayas. It sounded to me as though he enjoyed the country but there were many parts of his job which perhaps were difficult - and which he couldn’t share. He showed me his gold coin with his unit number, team name and motto. At first I thought it was a challenge coin and that he was giving it to me, but no, he wanted it back! He said he had something he could give me though and dug through his wallet until he found a Central Bank of Iraq 1000 Dinairs bill and a Da Afghanistan Bank 500 Afghanis bill, which were taken from the pockets of ‘bad guys’. Nice young man - and I thanked him for his service and for giving me the freedom to enjoy living and traveling in our fabulous ‘free world’. Freedom is NOT free - he and his family give up much for the rest of us. Could YOU work in 130 - 140 degrees? Nope, me either. In Texas, I found it too hot to even sit outside in 112 degrees and watch Kent work!

We arrived in Las Vegas and discovered Southwest would have our luggage delivered for $21.00 which we were to pay to the bell desk at the hotel. Good news!

After waiting in line 40 minutes at Dollar Car Rental, I found the amount I paid for the car rental in the Southwest package deal wasn’t such a deal after all. Taxes and fees and adding Crystal as a second driver doubled the price. No, I hadn’t read the fine print… Grrrrrr….. that made me cranky and I was still grumbling when the girl in the car lot took our ticket and started leading us and another couple to the ‘economy’ cars. She thought I was giving her a hard time and I said no, we’d just had a bad experience inside at the desk.

Crystal was just about to say, “Oh, can we have that PT Cruiser?” when the other customer said, “I WANT that PT Cruiser”. Okay, fine, whatever… just give us a car. As the attendant started to look around for another one for us, Crystal jokingly said, “We could take that blue car!” The girl paused for a moment then said, “Sure, go ahead”. YES!!! A blue convertible Sebring - okay now the night was looking up. Sayonara airport and luggage, we had serious cruising of the Strip and partying in our future. With the top down we headed to the Stratosphere, looking at the bright lights and congratulating ourselves on our turn of fortune. Of course we were texting Mr Fab to find out where he and the other posties were partying!

I checked us in while Crystal waited in the car and I also went to the bell desk to let them know our bags would arrive between 1 and 2 am and said the airline told me to leave $21.00 to cover the delivery charge. The bell girl - a really nasty, grunge rocker type young woman with dirty fingernails said, ‘No - there’s no charge’. Okay, whatever - more good news! We arranged to pick up our bags when we returned from our night on the town.

We drove to the Imperial Palace where Tricia, Chris, Colleen, Mr. Fab and a few others were partying at the Carnaval Club. We met them all in person for the very first time - and it was cool as we all ‘knew’ each other through our blogging friendships. We took tons of pictures - well, Chris took about 400 and the rest of us took a few. Everyone was hamming it up and having fun with Mr Fab and his feather boa. The band was too loud for me, but they played good music and we partied until 2 am then Crystal, Chris, Tricia and I went to Denny’s for breakfast. Chris and Tricia traveled from Toronto on only 2 hours sleep so they were very tired by this time and before our food arrived Chris had to leave to find his way home to bed. We walked Tricia back to the hotel when we were done. Crystal and I found our car and went to the hotel.

We fully expected to find our luggage waiting at the bell desk, but instead, we were greeted with bad news. The delivery driver wouldn’t leave the luggage as there was no $21.00 and the bell girl let him take it back to the airport. DUH, I asked if she could have called the manager perhaps to ask for some money or advice. Nope - there was no one she could call. Now, I was tired, tipsy and cranky and handed over the money to have her try again. She did not have change for my $25.00 and neither of us had a one dollar bill, so she asked us to go to the cashier - at the opposide side of the building. I ran out of patience and good will at this point, grabbed Crystal and headed to find someone with a little more authority to help us.

Crystal and I work great as a team. We joked a bit with the two guys at the registration desk before letting them have it with our long involved story of woe. Crystal has a way of getting guys to do just about anything she wants and the manager came out to talk to us. He said he’d get it worked out and we’d have our luggage at 6 am. It was now 3:50 a.m. and we were tired and ready to get to bed. I jokingly asked if he could perhaps upgrade us to a nice suite since we experienced such trauma. He said he’d see what he could do. OH!!!

By this time we were seated in a private room (I think it’s a soundproof room where they put potentially loud, obnoxious, drunk customers so they don’t cause a scene in front of other customers) and he had someone bring us bottled water. A few minutes later he came back and handed us a new set of door keys to an executive suite in the Premier Tower. He also handed me back my $15.00 ‘resort fee’ and said if we had any more trouble he’d be there until 8 a.m. and to call him. YES!!! A luxurious suite!