vegas, baby!

Gosh darn...should go to sleep but now I'm too busy blogging. Aw well, there's always work to catch up on some Z's. I must say I'm getting damn good at that sleep with your eyes open thing. Er, did I just say that? If you work where I work, disregard that last bit. Getting late ya know.

Anyway, got invited by a coworker to head out west and do some hiking and sightseeing in early October. Of course it didn't take much convincing to get me in on the trip, and so that's where I'll be come another month or so. I've been needing to get out to those national parks so this should be a great vacation. And topping it off with a weekend in Las Vegas...awww yeah.

Now I've heard mixed reviews of Vegas from Christians I know. Some say it's a really cool place with plenty to do outside the stuff with which it earns its "Sin City" tag, and that it's even a pleasant place to be. Cheap food, cheap drinks, cheap rooms, and lots of pretty lights. Hey, sounds like my kind of weekend hangout (although weekends cancel the cheap rooms part). Then there are those other Christians, also reliable sources, who say Vegas is probably the closest thing to Hell we'll experience here in the states. There's debauchery at every turn, the streets get chaotic and noisy, and there's really no way to escape the sin that permeates every cubic inch of the place. So...which will it be for yours truly?

Given my tendency to shy away from fundamentalism and my general tolerance of worldly fare (sometimes to a fault, admittedly) I'd put myself in the first crowd. Yeah, it'll have its bad parts, but overall I expect it to be some new kind of awesome. It'll be a taste of the party atmosphere I was never part of, and in some ways that's great. I trust myself to handle that end of it okay given I don't put myself in any extraordinarily dumb situations or get too tanked up to think straight. And I'll be there with old friends so just the experience itself will be enjoyable.

But I need to get some ideas for cool stuff to do out there. And since you're reading this, that's where you come in. I'm especially in need of suggestions on where to sleep on the strip or how to work the hotels for some sweet deals. We'd love to stay in one of those ritzy places and would pay a bit more for it if we could find a way to get the price a little closer to our range. And other ideas are of course welcome. Good casinos, good games, good times to do good activities, etc. And the reverse of those too. So speak up!