From Mountain Paradise to Sin City
I'm glad I told the front desk at the Holiday Inn in Kent that I wanted to leave by 11 and be at the airport by 11:30 despite my flight being scheduled for 1:50pm. First of all the shuttle driver, while nice, was going less than the speed limit the whole way. I immediately felt like this was someone who was being extra cautious because he was afraid of getting pulled over; I recognized that sort of tension about him because, of course, I've been there myself ... when I got my license back after losing it for driving without insurance, I was paranoid and drove under the speed limit and cautiously for a long time afterwards.
Then there was the security line at Sea-Tac. My god. Miles long. It did move along at a decent clip for such a long line and with so few xray machines. But it was more than a half hour long. Between the driving and security, I had only about an hour in the terminal to eat lunch before the flight. Which was okay, because there weren't many choices. Note to Self: whatever that bagel place was, don't ever purchase the pre-made caesar salad with chicken again. I couldn't eat more than a quarter of it; thank goodness the company pays for meals on the road.
It was worth those hassles for the flight, though. While in the air we passed over Mount St. Helens, and there was some steam coming up from out of it. What impressed me more was the hardened lava. Such a cool thing to see from so high up, tracing the paths where the material flowed between higher points and finally slowed, stopped, and hardened. A very stark outline.
We also passed over Mt. Hood, which was cool to see as well. And the pilot also pointed out Reno in the distance.
It took a good hour to make it off of the airport grounds, but I was finally driving down Las Vegas Boulevard towards my hotel. The Tuscany Hotel and Casino is about three blocks off of the strip. It's a nice hotel. I ate dinner in the Tuscany Grill and had a great meal: hot minestrone soup, wonderful fresh bruschetta, and an angel hair pasta in a light tomato sauce that was incredible.
After getting the room for the workshop set up for tomorrow, I decided to try my hand at the gambling for a short time. I put $5 in a Universal Monsters penny slot, played the maximum bet each time (about $2.50) and within about 10 minutes I was up $50. I played on that $50 for a little over an hour. When it ran out, I moved to another machine, quickly lost $10, then moved to another machine and slowly lost another $20. So I'm down $35 so far here in LV, but that's okay. I budgeted about $100 to gamble with, and tomorrow night I'll try my hand out on the strip for a little while when I go explore for dinner. And I might just try Roulette.
Then there was the security line at Sea-Tac. My god. Miles long. It did move along at a decent clip for such a long line and with so few xray machines. But it was more than a half hour long. Between the driving and security, I had only about an hour in the terminal to eat lunch before the flight. Which was okay, because there weren't many choices. Note to Self: whatever that bagel place was, don't ever purchase the pre-made caesar salad with chicken again. I couldn't eat more than a quarter of it; thank goodness the company pays for meals on the road.
It was worth those hassles for the flight, though. While in the air we passed over Mount St. Helens, and there was some steam coming up from out of it. What impressed me more was the hardened lava. Such a cool thing to see from so high up, tracing the paths where the material flowed between higher points and finally slowed, stopped, and hardened. A very stark outline.
We also passed over Mt. Hood, which was cool to see as well. And the pilot also pointed out Reno in the distance.
It took a good hour to make it off of the airport grounds, but I was finally driving down Las Vegas Boulevard towards my hotel. The Tuscany Hotel and Casino is about three blocks off of the strip. It's a nice hotel. I ate dinner in the Tuscany Grill and had a great meal: hot minestrone soup, wonderful fresh bruschetta, and an angel hair pasta in a light tomato sauce that was incredible.
After getting the room for the workshop set up for tomorrow, I decided to try my hand at the gambling for a short time. I put $5 in a Universal Monsters penny slot, played the maximum bet each time (about $2.50) and within about 10 minutes I was up $50. I played on that $50 for a little over an hour. When it ran out, I moved to another machine, quickly lost $10, then moved to another machine and slowly lost another $20. So I'm down $35 so far here in LV, but that's okay. I budgeted about $100 to gamble with, and tomorrow night I'll try my hand out on the strip for a little while when I go explore for dinner. And I might just try Roulette.