The Weekend So Far...

Howdy all--I hope everyone is having a wonderful holiday weekend.

Mine is pretty cool so far, but my plans for the day have been scrambled once again. Originally, I was gonna sleep in today (so far so good...), and then spend a couple hours moving stuff from the garage up here to my room, doing laundry, and writing. That ain't gonna happen, at least today. Here it is after 1 pm on Saturday afternoon, and I *just* woke up. And I have to be downtown at Binion's at 4 for that final casino employees tournament.

Anyhow, when I got home from work yesterday afternoon, I stopped in the kitchen to put a couple of Gatorade bottles in the fridge (the gas station on the corner has a buy-2-get-1-free deal going which is pretty damn irresistible when it's 108 degrees outside). My roommate had the day off, obviously, so we sat down at the dining room table for an hour or so just chatting and playing with the dogs.

He and his girlfriend were going to a bbq at the neighbor's place, and never having had a holiday off in the past three years, I had made no plans for the evening--I was actually just going to get a 12-pack and sit up on the balcony watching all the fireworks shows. So while they puttered around, I came upstairs, checked the email, and promptly fell asleep. I woke up a couple hours later when one of the dogs stuck his wet nose directly on the bottom of my foot. I noticed that it was getting dark outside, so I grabbed some sandals and my keys and headed over to the Kwik E Mart to get some beer.

There wasn't much of a selection--I was hoping for Michelob Light, but nobody seems to sell it anymore--so I grabbed two six packs of that new Bud Light Lime beer. Oh yeah, and I also put $60 worth of gas in the truck, too.

As I was driving home, I could see a couple of fireworks shows off in the distance, so I hurried to put the beer on ice, grab my camp chair, and head upstairs. Just as I did, my roommate and all the neighbors showed up, moving the party from one house to another. So about eight or ten of us hung out on the balcony watching all the fireworks going off all over the Vegas valley.

It. Was. Incredible.

Not only do we have a million-dollar view from the balcony, but there were so many fireworks going off all over the city that we couldn't count them all. It was amazing--we could see all the way from way out west past Spring Valley to beyond Nellis Air Force Base in the far northeast. There were dozens of fireworks shows going on all over Clark County, and we could see them all.

But the best one, by far, was the one at Dragon Ridge, which is a pretty upscale country-club and community about a mile and a half up the road. I had no idea that the place even existed, but they put on an over-the-top show that was up close and personal. It was very cool to see. And just like they'd planned it, as soon as their finale went dark, somebody hit the switch at both Green Valley Ranch and Sunset Station, and their fireworks displays went off. Our house is between the two casinos, so it was kinda like watching in stereo.

Once the fireworks ended, we brought the party inside for a little bit of poker. We have a big gameroom here in the house with a poker table featured prominently in the middle of it. So about six of the guys stuck around and hung out for the rest of the night playing a little bit of low-stakes hold-em, and when we finally wrapped it up at 4:30 this morning, I was up twenty bucks.

The bummer of the whole night was that as soon as I turned off the light and hit the bed, I could see the first hint of daylight creeping in from behind my blinds. My Friday night had turned into Saturday morning before I knew it...

So I slept for about seven hours or so, waking up when I heard my roommate up here picking up the remnants of the party from the gameroom. I got up and gave him a hand, and also put in a load of laundry. In a bit I'm going to have to shower and shave, then head on back downtown and take another shot at getting my picture on the wall down at Binion's.

Mikey