Jeff Putz Week, so far

Thursday night began Jeff Putz week. Actually, nothing really went down that night other than the idea that I wouldn't have to get up the next morning. And that itself wasn't a good start, because my lack of stuff to do was rooted in the cancellation of my client, last minute, to shoot video. Now I know to write a cancellation fee into the contract.

So Friday, Catherine decided we should go to Cedar Point, and that seemed like a good plan with the nice weather. Bonus that the Paramount Parks acquisition happened, and a few people got some promotions at the park. Cath actually got her scared ass on Magnum and Raptor, which is a good thing because how the hell else is she going to date a coaster geek? From the park, we stopped at Old Timer Tim's house, where some of his co-workers gathered. Good times ensued.

Didn't do anything Friday night either except try to stay up, playing video games, but I couldn't do it. The cats kept looking at me all sleepy, and I couldn't play Zuma anymore. I crashed.

I booked my Vegas trip by Southwest Vacations, and got a pretty good deal. But I remember now what I hate about Southwest, the cluster fuck pick your seat boarding procedure. You get these morons who aren't flying with anyone take all of the window and aisle seats, then get all pissy when you ask them to move around so you can sit with your child, girlfriend, grandma, whatever.

We arrived in Las Vegas at 4:10pm or so. Catherine has never been here, and her reaction is I think what everyone thinks... You've gotta be fucking kidding me. This is my third time here, and I still think it. It's so absurd, how excessive it all is. But I suppose that's the point. Very busy streets.

Upon arrival at Caesars Palace, they didn't have a non-smoking room ready, so they upgraded us to a room in the newly renovated Palace Tower. Awesome. View of the pool, 22nd floor, flat screen TV (which will never get watched), jacuzzi tub, trendy walnut furniture. Did I mention awesome?

We went across the street to Margaritaville, knowing that we hadn't eaten in like eight hours and weren't in the mood for hunting. Got a nice, if rather warm, outside seat. Dry heat or not, 100 degrees is 100 degrees. Food was about average. Had some drinks.

And that was pretty much it, as eastern time caught up with us. There was a private party in the pool area, probably for regular customers, and a massive fireworks display set to music. Shit was blowing up right outside of our window. It was the single most amazing fireworks show I had seen.

Today we got up and started roaming around at 8am. Our mission was to find a breakfast buffet, and that's why we bought the Internet access, to research. Excalibur's deal sounded best, so we walked down there. Strip was like a ghost town, oddly enough. Only a few people out nursing hangovers, including one guy that was clearly doing the walk of shame from somewhere.

The Round Table Buffet wasn't horrible. The champagne was terrible, but the food was good and average. You can't really fuck up breakfast food, but we fucked up the breakfast food. The casino was kinda neat. I had never seen it before.

We walked our way through Luxor and Mandalay Bay as well, the latter of which is really a beautiful place. We took the tram back to Excalibur, crossed to MGM, and walked back on that side, stopping through Paris.

By this time (11am), it was getting hot, and we wanted to check out the amazing pool area. Way too many kids, so we decided we'd go into the Venus Pool area, where you can do things European style. The motivation wasn't to see boobies, it was to get away from the damn kids and find a place to put down our stuff. It was seriously crowded. However, you need $30 if you have testicles, $20 if you have breasts, so we hung out with the common folk. The security guy was a total steroid monkey. And the rich drunk people are more pathetic than the homeless people. They're so worried about how they look and what people think.

You know how a lot of pools they heat the water? Here they actually cool the water. The serving girls are clearly hired based on their bodies, all exactly the same. Everything is marble. There was a rock cover band playing. The food looked amazing. Best pool area I've ever seen.

And that's about where we are now. This is the kind of vacation I really needed, with no particular plan. Tonight I see Blue Man Group again, but that's the only thing I have scheduled.

I love this town.