Well, People’s Court is a rerun so I find myself with a little bit of time for a trip report. My trip was July 9th-16th and I stayed at Planet Hollywood. I was travelling with my 13 year old daughter for the Starpower National Dance Competition.
Day 1: Travel day. Flight left Seattle on time at 11:30 and was a pretty decent flight except for the lady that kept screaming every time there was a dip or a bump. Landing was a bit rough but I expected a lot worse considering the temperature in Vegas. Took the rental car shuttle and the driver unloaded and took off so fast I didn’t even have a chance to tip him. That put me up five bucks before I even started to gamble. At the rental counter I got suckered into an upgrade to a convertible Mustang. I knew I was getting suckered but it is my daughters dream car so it was cool. Unfortunately, I was giving my friend Lyn and her daughter a ride to the hotel and there was practically no trunk space. That left us having to put one suitcase between the girls and the other in Lyn’s lap so we didn’t look nearly as cool as we had planned when we rolled up to Planet Hollywood. I’m not sure where I heard this advice, but I decided to valet because it is such a long walk through the mall to get to the hotel. I probably heard it here so thank you. That was some good advice. At check in the guy behind the counter was pretty sure he knew me because I called once to change my rate. I have a pretty common Swedish last name that sounds rare so people always think they know someone I’m related to. I played along and thanked him for saving me so much money on the rate change. All during this time, there was a belligerent man at the next station yelling and dropping F-bombs because he had been trying to drink at the pool without Id and they wouldn’t let him. He kind of had the idea that he was a big shot and was pretty pissed that PH didn’t agree. The guy who was helping me apologized and I told him it was OK. My daughter hears way worse than that at school. Then he commented that I had a really great rate of 69 dollars for Friday and Saturday night. I know it was dumb but I am honest and I told him that the rate was supposed to be 109. He winked at me and whispered that he was hooking me up. Fine with me! After dropping our bags, we had a meet and greet at the pool with the dance team. In my opinion, the pool sucks. There is absolutely no shade unless you pay for it. Being very fair skinned and cheap, that left me uninterested in the pool. We decided to leave and get something to eat. We ate at Cabo Wabo Cantina. I had the southwest cobb salad and my daughter had a chicken wrap. Both were good, the service was good, and I loved all the music they played. We got there right before the dinner rush so it wasn’t too crowded and we got our food quickly. After that, we tried to hook up with some dance kids and go do the zip line at Freemont street but we couldn’t find anyone. We decided to walk down to Serendipity and get a frozen hot chocolate. When we got there, there wasn’t much of a line at the walk up window so we thought we would try our luck at getting a seat inside. No luck. We went back out to the walk up window and the line had grown quite a bit. We got in line and after it not moving for quite a while I finally approached a group of women and asked if they were drinking the frozen hot chocolate and if it was worth the wait and the money. They said it was just ok and we should probably try it at a time when the wait wasn’t so long and it wasn’t so hot and humid. We decided to skip the frozen hot chocolate and headed back to PH to get a Jamba Juice. On the way we watched the only Bellagio fountain show we ever got around to seeing . I forget what song it was and it wasn’t very impressive to a 13 year old girl who had her heart set on frozen hot chocolate and zip lining but she sucked it up and wasn’t too unpleasant about it. We went to bed at about midnight.
Day 2: We got up at about 6:30 and made our way down to the convention area to support some of her team mates who were doing their solos. I’m glad we did because even though nobody told us, we were expected to be at as many of the dances as we could to show our support. So that pretty much took up the whole day. Dinner was at PF Chang’s with a group of 22 people. The waiter told us for a group that large they usually charged 25 dollars per person and gave us our choice of three appetizers and four entrees. We negotiated 4 appetizers and 5 entrees because half of our group was kids who barely eat anything. Still, it was 70 bucks for my daughter and me for a soda and tip included. The food was good and I’d probably go again but I wouldn’t do that deal. After that , the girls ran the mall until closing and I lost about 30 bucks in the slots. Bed time was around 12 again.
Day 3: Today is the big day for my daughter’s dances. They did very well but they were up against some pretty tough competition from California. Apparently in California it is acceptable to let your 12-13 year olds dance like hookers and squeeze their breasts in the judge’s direction. That’s the team that won but honestly, I would much rather lose than teach my daughter to dance like that. Our team did take first place in their tap category but there really wasn’t much competition. Tap seems to be dying out. During the dancing, we snuck Panda Express so we didn’t have a big dinner that night. After all the dancing was over, we decided to go to Freemont street and finally ride the zip line. It was also our first opportunity to take out the Mustang. Since it was dark we decided to take the top down. It was still hot and it was pretty scary to drive the north end of the strip to downtown without the roof of the car protecting us. We easily found downtown and made our way to the zip line. Unfortunately, it was closed due to lightning. So, we bought the girls a milkshake and then made our way back to PH and the mall. Not sure if you noticed but this is now day 3 and I’ve only had the chance to gamble 30 bucks. By then I was really wanting to stay out all night but I didn’t. Went to bed at about midnight again.
Day 4: The day I’ve been waiting for. This is the day my friend Violet was coming to town. She was due to fly in at 5:30pm and I was planning on picking her up at the airport. Lyn was going to take my daughter to her team dinner in exchange for the ride to the hotel so my night was free. Dance competition started at 8 am so I rolled out of bed and went down to watch without a shower or makeup. After the first few numbers I had just enough time to go shower and get back downstairs for the next kids from our team. Luckily, the competition was running very early and we were done for the day by about 10:15am. Lyn took the girls down to the pool and I found myself with the room all to myself and the People’s court was on. But, I already saw that episode so I decided to call Violet and make sure her flight was still on time. It turns out I called her right after she stepped off her standby flight. She was already there and it was only 11:15! Bonus! I picked her up and we headed to In and Out for lunch. Once again, the food was terrible. I’m not sure what happened but they used to be one of my favorites but now I don’t think I’ll ever go back. Way too long of a wait for mediocre food and a warm milk shake (how do they even make a warm milkshake?). After we ate, I took Violet back to PH so she could check into her room. They got her right in and we were ready to hit the town. We dropped some money off for my daughter and made sure she was taken care of for the evening and we started our gambling. We started right in PH even though I had had no luck earlier in the week. We hit the slots and within ten minutes Violet hit a 500 dollar jackpot on an Alladin slot. Yay for her but I just kept losing. After a few minutes, Violet made a proposal. She said she came to Vegas to either lose all her money or win a million bucks. She wanted me to take half of the money she just won and whatever I won (or lost)with it would be hers. She knows that my bankroll was not as big as I had hoped because competitive dance is very very expensive. Knowing that she often plays two slot machines at a time anyway, I gladly took her up on her offer. We played tons of slots, we were up, we were down and we made our way from PH all the way to Treasure Island where I bought dinner at Kahunaville with a Groupon that I had bought before I left. We each got a side salad (2.99 value) and an entrée (up to 23.99 value) for the grand sum of $21 plus tip on the whole value of the meal. Pretty good deal. We kept on playing slots and played on a Wheel of Fortune machine and an Amazing Race machine before we found The Big Wheel. I don’t know how to exactly describe it but basically you bet on the numbers 1,3,6,12,25, or 50. The higher the number the greater the pay out. We played that machine for an hour or two until I needed to get back and check on my daughter. We ended up exactly even for the night after playing for about 10 hours. We really had a lot of fun.
Day 5: The last day of dancing. There was one production number left. It included all 39 kids on the team plus two dads. All we had to do was get through this one dance and it would be over. Unless, of course, if we did really well and made it into the Battle of the Stars. Considering this dance had been kind of an embarrassment all season, that wasn’t really very likely. Well, long story short, the dance ended up winning first place overall in the 20 and up age category. Remember the dads I mentioned in the dance? They made the average age so high that it was a really easy category to beat. There were only 8 numbers in the whole 900+ number competition in that category and our group beat them all. Yippee!! There went our free Saturday in Vegas. Dinner that night was a team dinner at Planet Dailies. Considering the reservation was for 60 people, I thought management would propose a buffet of some sort but they didn’t and ordering was a disaster. Of course all the kids wanted to sit together at a few tables so it made it really difficult for the waiters to take accurate orders. The wait staff really tried their best but it was a tough situation. I was embarrassed about how unforgiving some of the people in our group were. After dinner the girls from my daughters dances decided to go to the Strat and ride the rides. I am afraid of heights so I had no plans for going up the tower so I lied about my daughters age when I bought her tickets. Unfortunately, I didn’t lie well enough because I read the sign wrong. I told them she was 15 which still required supervision up in the tower but they said a friend could take her so I sent her up with one of the dads. While we were waiting to meet up with the other families I saw one of those Big Wheel machines so we high tailed it over there to get a seat before they all filled up and found ourselves sitting with Gary from the reality show Teen Mom. We played the wheel for a while but weren’t doing great. Violet and I had both decided to only bring about $150 with us and make it a cheap night. I was down about 50 bucks pretty quickly but that wasn’t a huge deal because I still had 100 bucks left. But, Violet ran out fast so I gave her 50 of my last 100. How could I not after all of her generosity the night before? Anyway, I had promised another friend, Kari, that I would spend some time with her at a seedy casino. Well, we were already at the Strat and that’s pretty seedy so she started playing on a Wolf Run machine. She ended up staying on that machine for six hours. She started with 40 bucks and cashed out at 500. I went through most of my money pretty fast but it was cool to just hang out with her (Violet went home with the kids at about midnight). Kari has had a pretty stressful year trying to continue to grow her business. She and a friend invented something a few years ago (probably some of you have seen it) and she spends a lot of time on the road at shows trying to sell it and she really needed a night out to blow off steam. I ended up dropping her off at MGM Signature Suites at about 4:30 am. When I got back to PH the valet was full so I had to walk from self park. I got into bed right at about 5am. Sometime during the night I decided beer was a better value than soda because you got so much more for your tip money so I slept pretty well.
Day 6: Woke up pretty late but call time for the Battle of the Stars wasn’t until 1:00. We expected that they would dance pretty quickly and we would be out of there in no time. Wrong!! They didn’t actually go on until almost 6:00 and then we had to wait for awards. The team ended up winning 1st place in their category and took home a gigantic trophy and got a confetti cannon fired at them. The kids were pretty surprised. They thought they’d take second but they sent those kids from Guam home with their spirits crushed by a bunch of little girls. We had a quick dinner at Subway and then planned on riding the coaster at New York New York. But, the coaster was closed due to rain and lightning. Neither of which we saw while walking there and back. So, again, we sent the kids to the mall and did a bit of gambling. No big wins or losses to speak of.
Day 7: We are finally free of the dance competition and we have tickets to The Price is Right. We checked in early but I guess the producer didn’t like us because neither of us made it on stage. We did a little bit of shopping downstairs at Bally’s while we waited for the show to start. Bally’s was really strict about where minors could be. They wouldn’t even let my daughter stand in line for TPIR because it was too close to the slots. That was cool though because we got to cut the line. I’m glad that PH has a much more liberal approach to kids around the gaming. I didn’t think TPIR was worth the money. Joey Fatone was the host and he looked like he rolled out of bed and acted like the show was beneath him. I did win 1,000 points on my players club card in a random drawing which I used to buy two t shirts and a magnet in the gift shop at Paris. I thought the shirt was 20 bucks but it rang down at 3.99. I was unsure of what size to buy so I bought two and only had to pay a few bucks difference. After TPIR we went back to the rooms to change. That’s when the “room check” incident happened. We were in a hurry to get dinner out of the way so we didn’t report it. We had dinner at Sr. Frogs with another Groupon (50 bucks worth of food for 25). IT WAS AWFUL!!!! I would recommend never ever going there ever. First, I was sitting on the bench outside the restaurant after we checked in and were waiting for our table and casino security was all over me threatening a $1,000 dollar fine for contributing to the delinquency of a minor by sitting on the bench with her. I had no idea it was wrong. I thought it was the waiting area for the restaurant. They made us stand in the doorway blocking everyone’s coming and going instead. When we were seated the band was on a break so we ordered our food despite the fact that the emcee was obnoxiously loud. We had no idea how loud it could possibly get until the band started to play. It was a phillipino band and I’m sure I’ve seen them before but I don’t know their name. They were really good but the sound level was way too high. We couldn’t hear each other or the waiter and we saw several other tables leave before ever ordering. We stuck it out because I had already paid in advance and we thought it wouldn’t take too long. It did end up taking a long time because they got my daughter’s order wrong. Probably because they couldn’t hear her. We finally got our food and it was just OK. At that time, Violet asked why they don’t turn the music down a bit. It was obvious that nobody was having any fun. The waitress said she didn’t have a good answer and she was constantly losing her voice from having to scream so much. I’m sure she’ll need hearing aids within the next few years if not sooner. Anyway, someone else requested the music be turned down and instead they turned it up. We ended up walking out without eating most of our food. Don’t ever go there unless you want to eat alone and have your senses assaulted. It was miserable. After that we went down to Freemont street and tried to get on the zip line again. This time we made it. Even though I am afraid of heights, I decided I was going to do this. For most of the wait time I wasn’t scared at all until I got up on the scaffolding. It’s really wobbly up there and you feel like you might fall through the plywood. The worst part was having to stand on a little foot stool with nothing to hold on to while they hook you up to the line. I tend to have vertigo so this was very scary for me but it didn’t last too long. The guy gave us some instructions but I don’t remember that even happening and off we went. It was pretty fun but as I was coming in for my landing I thought for sure I was going to hit my back on the platform but I didn’t. That scaffolding was scary too so I got out of there pretty quickly. I looked at our photos but I didn’t buy anything because I looked like the fat people on Wall E. I don’t want any photographic evidence of that. So we went back to the PH mall and bought my daughter a purse we had promised her if we won any money. I didn’t win any but Violet did. I decided it would be better if I just paid the money instead of try to win it. I never win. So now my 13 year old daughter has a $138 purse. That’s kind of embarrassing to me. After we found someone for my daughter to hang with at the mall we remembered there was something left on our to- do list so we headed over to the MGM to win 2 million dollars on the Lion’s Share slot. It was right where I thought it would be (thank you LVA) but it was out of order so I am not a millionaire. The slots at MGM were really tight so we decided to leave. By that time we were way inside MGM so we decided to try out the monorail. We go there just in the nick of time to catch the last ride of the night. As we were walking to the monorail my daughter called and asked me to swing by the Sbarro’s on the strip and get her some breadsticks. Luckily for her, there is a 24 hour Sbarro’s inside Bally’s where the monorail was dropping us off. Got to bed at 2.
Day 8: Spent the morning packing up and had housekeeping knocking on our door at 8am asking when we were leaving. I told her 11 even though we planned on leaving earlier than that. That was irritating to me so I took all my leftover water bottles that I had planned on leaving for her with me. That ended up backfiring because I forgot they were in my bag and tried to take them through airport security. I didn’t get in any trouble though. They just threw them away. After we checked out we still had one Groupon left to use. It was for Pampas Brazilian Grill. We had two surf and turf buffet lunches for 28 bucks. My daughter and I had that and Violet had just a salad bar and ate any of the meat we didn’t want. They called the meal “the parade of meats” and the waiters kept bringing meat out on a big stick and giving us slices of it. All the meat was really good but I think the salad bar should have had more build your own salad ingredients. It was still a really good, quick meal. I highly recommend it. After lunch we made it over to NY/NY to finally get on the roller coaster. I didn’t go because last time I went on it it beat me up pretty bad. Violet did and she ended up with a migraine later. We spent the rest of the afternoon wandering NY/NY and gassing up the rental car. I’m glad I didn’t opt for the prepaid gas option. I was tempted to because the gas was so much cheaper there than at home but it would have been $47 to do that and I only had to put in $20. The flight home was pretty turbulent and the landing was the hardest I’ve ever experienced but I honestly think I have overcome my fear of flying. I wasn’t worried at all.
So that’s pretty much the end of my report. I do have some random thoughts and I think they will be easier to add here than insert them in the appropriate sections. Our room at PH was really clean. It over looked the rooftop, Harmon Tower, and you could see the NY coaster in the distance. The rooms are very dark. Abby Lee Miller Dance Company was not at the competition. Neither was Candy Apple’s Dance Studio. I was hoping they would be there. This trip I did something I normally would not do. I bought a Styrofoam cooler and kept it stocked with bottled water and Red Bull. I also kept a lot of snack food and protein bars in the room. Apparently, growing kids like to eat and one meal a day doesn’t cut it for them. Gary from Teen Mom seemed like a pretty nice guy. We sat and played with him for about an hour. If anyone asked for a photo with him he obliged. When I first started this report I thought I’d only fill a page or two. It took way longer than I expected so I hope someone reads it.
Day 1: Travel day. Flight left Seattle on time at 11:30 and was a pretty decent flight except for the lady that kept screaming every time there was a dip or a bump. Landing was a bit rough but I expected a lot worse considering the temperature in Vegas. Took the rental car shuttle and the driver unloaded and took off so fast I didn’t even have a chance to tip him. That put me up five bucks before I even started to gamble. At the rental counter I got suckered into an upgrade to a convertible Mustang. I knew I was getting suckered but it is my daughters dream car so it was cool. Unfortunately, I was giving my friend Lyn and her daughter a ride to the hotel and there was practically no trunk space. That left us having to put one suitcase between the girls and the other in Lyn’s lap so we didn’t look nearly as cool as we had planned when we rolled up to Planet Hollywood. I’m not sure where I heard this advice, but I decided to valet because it is such a long walk through the mall to get to the hotel. I probably heard it here so thank you. That was some good advice. At check in the guy behind the counter was pretty sure he knew me because I called once to change my rate. I have a pretty common Swedish last name that sounds rare so people always think they know someone I’m related to. I played along and thanked him for saving me so much money on the rate change. All during this time, there was a belligerent man at the next station yelling and dropping F-bombs because he had been trying to drink at the pool without Id and they wouldn’t let him. He kind of had the idea that he was a big shot and was pretty pissed that PH didn’t agree. The guy who was helping me apologized and I told him it was OK. My daughter hears way worse than that at school. Then he commented that I had a really great rate of 69 dollars for Friday and Saturday night. I know it was dumb but I am honest and I told him that the rate was supposed to be 109. He winked at me and whispered that he was hooking me up. Fine with me! After dropping our bags, we had a meet and greet at the pool with the dance team. In my opinion, the pool sucks. There is absolutely no shade unless you pay for it. Being very fair skinned and cheap, that left me uninterested in the pool. We decided to leave and get something to eat. We ate at Cabo Wabo Cantina. I had the southwest cobb salad and my daughter had a chicken wrap. Both were good, the service was good, and I loved all the music they played. We got there right before the dinner rush so it wasn’t too crowded and we got our food quickly. After that, we tried to hook up with some dance kids and go do the zip line at Freemont street but we couldn’t find anyone. We decided to walk down to Serendipity and get a frozen hot chocolate. When we got there, there wasn’t much of a line at the walk up window so we thought we would try our luck at getting a seat inside. No luck. We went back out to the walk up window and the line had grown quite a bit. We got in line and after it not moving for quite a while I finally approached a group of women and asked if they were drinking the frozen hot chocolate and if it was worth the wait and the money. They said it was just ok and we should probably try it at a time when the wait wasn’t so long and it wasn’t so hot and humid. We decided to skip the frozen hot chocolate and headed back to PH to get a Jamba Juice. On the way we watched the only Bellagio fountain show we ever got around to seeing . I forget what song it was and it wasn’t very impressive to a 13 year old girl who had her heart set on frozen hot chocolate and zip lining but she sucked it up and wasn’t too unpleasant about it. We went to bed at about midnight.
Day 2: We got up at about 6:30 and made our way down to the convention area to support some of her team mates who were doing their solos. I’m glad we did because even though nobody told us, we were expected to be at as many of the dances as we could to show our support. So that pretty much took up the whole day. Dinner was at PF Chang’s with a group of 22 people. The waiter told us for a group that large they usually charged 25 dollars per person and gave us our choice of three appetizers and four entrees. We negotiated 4 appetizers and 5 entrees because half of our group was kids who barely eat anything. Still, it was 70 bucks for my daughter and me for a soda and tip included. The food was good and I’d probably go again but I wouldn’t do that deal. After that , the girls ran the mall until closing and I lost about 30 bucks in the slots. Bed time was around 12 again.
Day 3: Today is the big day for my daughter’s dances. They did very well but they were up against some pretty tough competition from California. Apparently in California it is acceptable to let your 12-13 year olds dance like hookers and squeeze their breasts in the judge’s direction. That’s the team that won but honestly, I would much rather lose than teach my daughter to dance like that. Our team did take first place in their tap category but there really wasn’t much competition. Tap seems to be dying out. During the dancing, we snuck Panda Express so we didn’t have a big dinner that night. After all the dancing was over, we decided to go to Freemont street and finally ride the zip line. It was also our first opportunity to take out the Mustang. Since it was dark we decided to take the top down. It was still hot and it was pretty scary to drive the north end of the strip to downtown without the roof of the car protecting us. We easily found downtown and made our way to the zip line. Unfortunately, it was closed due to lightning. So, we bought the girls a milkshake and then made our way back to PH and the mall. Not sure if you noticed but this is now day 3 and I’ve only had the chance to gamble 30 bucks. By then I was really wanting to stay out all night but I didn’t. Went to bed at about midnight again.
Day 4: The day I’ve been waiting for. This is the day my friend Violet was coming to town. She was due to fly in at 5:30pm and I was planning on picking her up at the airport. Lyn was going to take my daughter to her team dinner in exchange for the ride to the hotel so my night was free. Dance competition started at 8 am so I rolled out of bed and went down to watch without a shower or makeup. After the first few numbers I had just enough time to go shower and get back downstairs for the next kids from our team. Luckily, the competition was running very early and we were done for the day by about 10:15am. Lyn took the girls down to the pool and I found myself with the room all to myself and the People’s court was on. But, I already saw that episode so I decided to call Violet and make sure her flight was still on time. It turns out I called her right after she stepped off her standby flight. She was already there and it was only 11:15! Bonus! I picked her up and we headed to In and Out for lunch. Once again, the food was terrible. I’m not sure what happened but they used to be one of my favorites but now I don’t think I’ll ever go back. Way too long of a wait for mediocre food and a warm milk shake (how do they even make a warm milkshake?). After we ate, I took Violet back to PH so she could check into her room. They got her right in and we were ready to hit the town. We dropped some money off for my daughter and made sure she was taken care of for the evening and we started our gambling. We started right in PH even though I had had no luck earlier in the week. We hit the slots and within ten minutes Violet hit a 500 dollar jackpot on an Alladin slot. Yay for her but I just kept losing. After a few minutes, Violet made a proposal. She said she came to Vegas to either lose all her money or win a million bucks. She wanted me to take half of the money she just won and whatever I won (or lost)with it would be hers. She knows that my bankroll was not as big as I had hoped because competitive dance is very very expensive. Knowing that she often plays two slot machines at a time anyway, I gladly took her up on her offer. We played tons of slots, we were up, we were down and we made our way from PH all the way to Treasure Island where I bought dinner at Kahunaville with a Groupon that I had bought before I left. We each got a side salad (2.99 value) and an entrée (up to 23.99 value) for the grand sum of $21 plus tip on the whole value of the meal. Pretty good deal. We kept on playing slots and played on a Wheel of Fortune machine and an Amazing Race machine before we found The Big Wheel. I don’t know how to exactly describe it but basically you bet on the numbers 1,3,6,12,25, or 50. The higher the number the greater the pay out. We played that machine for an hour or two until I needed to get back and check on my daughter. We ended up exactly even for the night after playing for about 10 hours. We really had a lot of fun.
Day 5: The last day of dancing. There was one production number left. It included all 39 kids on the team plus two dads. All we had to do was get through this one dance and it would be over. Unless, of course, if we did really well and made it into the Battle of the Stars. Considering this dance had been kind of an embarrassment all season, that wasn’t really very likely. Well, long story short, the dance ended up winning first place overall in the 20 and up age category. Remember the dads I mentioned in the dance? They made the average age so high that it was a really easy category to beat. There were only 8 numbers in the whole 900+ number competition in that category and our group beat them all. Yippee!! There went our free Saturday in Vegas. Dinner that night was a team dinner at Planet Dailies. Considering the reservation was for 60 people, I thought management would propose a buffet of some sort but they didn’t and ordering was a disaster. Of course all the kids wanted to sit together at a few tables so it made it really difficult for the waiters to take accurate orders. The wait staff really tried their best but it was a tough situation. I was embarrassed about how unforgiving some of the people in our group were. After dinner the girls from my daughters dances decided to go to the Strat and ride the rides. I am afraid of heights so I had no plans for going up the tower so I lied about my daughters age when I bought her tickets. Unfortunately, I didn’t lie well enough because I read the sign wrong. I told them she was 15 which still required supervision up in the tower but they said a friend could take her so I sent her up with one of the dads. While we were waiting to meet up with the other families I saw one of those Big Wheel machines so we high tailed it over there to get a seat before they all filled up and found ourselves sitting with Gary from the reality show Teen Mom. We played the wheel for a while but weren’t doing great. Violet and I had both decided to only bring about $150 with us and make it a cheap night. I was down about 50 bucks pretty quickly but that wasn’t a huge deal because I still had 100 bucks left. But, Violet ran out fast so I gave her 50 of my last 100. How could I not after all of her generosity the night before? Anyway, I had promised another friend, Kari, that I would spend some time with her at a seedy casino. Well, we were already at the Strat and that’s pretty seedy so she started playing on a Wolf Run machine. She ended up staying on that machine for six hours. She started with 40 bucks and cashed out at 500. I went through most of my money pretty fast but it was cool to just hang out with her (Violet went home with the kids at about midnight). Kari has had a pretty stressful year trying to continue to grow her business. She and a friend invented something a few years ago (probably some of you have seen it) and she spends a lot of time on the road at shows trying to sell it and she really needed a night out to blow off steam. I ended up dropping her off at MGM Signature Suites at about 4:30 am. When I got back to PH the valet was full so I had to walk from self park. I got into bed right at about 5am. Sometime during the night I decided beer was a better value than soda because you got so much more for your tip money so I slept pretty well.
Day 6: Woke up pretty late but call time for the Battle of the Stars wasn’t until 1:00. We expected that they would dance pretty quickly and we would be out of there in no time. Wrong!! They didn’t actually go on until almost 6:00 and then we had to wait for awards. The team ended up winning 1st place in their category and took home a gigantic trophy and got a confetti cannon fired at them. The kids were pretty surprised. They thought they’d take second but they sent those kids from Guam home with their spirits crushed by a bunch of little girls. We had a quick dinner at Subway and then planned on riding the coaster at New York New York. But, the coaster was closed due to rain and lightning. Neither of which we saw while walking there and back. So, again, we sent the kids to the mall and did a bit of gambling. No big wins or losses to speak of.
Day 7: We are finally free of the dance competition and we have tickets to The Price is Right. We checked in early but I guess the producer didn’t like us because neither of us made it on stage. We did a little bit of shopping downstairs at Bally’s while we waited for the show to start. Bally’s was really strict about where minors could be. They wouldn’t even let my daughter stand in line for TPIR because it was too close to the slots. That was cool though because we got to cut the line. I’m glad that PH has a much more liberal approach to kids around the gaming. I didn’t think TPIR was worth the money. Joey Fatone was the host and he looked like he rolled out of bed and acted like the show was beneath him. I did win 1,000 points on my players club card in a random drawing which I used to buy two t shirts and a magnet in the gift shop at Paris. I thought the shirt was 20 bucks but it rang down at 3.99. I was unsure of what size to buy so I bought two and only had to pay a few bucks difference. After TPIR we went back to the rooms to change. That’s when the “room check” incident happened. We were in a hurry to get dinner out of the way so we didn’t report it. We had dinner at Sr. Frogs with another Groupon (50 bucks worth of food for 25). IT WAS AWFUL!!!! I would recommend never ever going there ever. First, I was sitting on the bench outside the restaurant after we checked in and were waiting for our table and casino security was all over me threatening a $1,000 dollar fine for contributing to the delinquency of a minor by sitting on the bench with her. I had no idea it was wrong. I thought it was the waiting area for the restaurant. They made us stand in the doorway blocking everyone’s coming and going instead. When we were seated the band was on a break so we ordered our food despite the fact that the emcee was obnoxiously loud. We had no idea how loud it could possibly get until the band started to play. It was a phillipino band and I’m sure I’ve seen them before but I don’t know their name. They were really good but the sound level was way too high. We couldn’t hear each other or the waiter and we saw several other tables leave before ever ordering. We stuck it out because I had already paid in advance and we thought it wouldn’t take too long. It did end up taking a long time because they got my daughter’s order wrong. Probably because they couldn’t hear her. We finally got our food and it was just OK. At that time, Violet asked why they don’t turn the music down a bit. It was obvious that nobody was having any fun. The waitress said she didn’t have a good answer and she was constantly losing her voice from having to scream so much. I’m sure she’ll need hearing aids within the next few years if not sooner. Anyway, someone else requested the music be turned down and instead they turned it up. We ended up walking out without eating most of our food. Don’t ever go there unless you want to eat alone and have your senses assaulted. It was miserable. After that we went down to Freemont street and tried to get on the zip line again. This time we made it. Even though I am afraid of heights, I decided I was going to do this. For most of the wait time I wasn’t scared at all until I got up on the scaffolding. It’s really wobbly up there and you feel like you might fall through the plywood. The worst part was having to stand on a little foot stool with nothing to hold on to while they hook you up to the line. I tend to have vertigo so this was very scary for me but it didn’t last too long. The guy gave us some instructions but I don’t remember that even happening and off we went. It was pretty fun but as I was coming in for my landing I thought for sure I was going to hit my back on the platform but I didn’t. That scaffolding was scary too so I got out of there pretty quickly. I looked at our photos but I didn’t buy anything because I looked like the fat people on Wall E. I don’t want any photographic evidence of that. So we went back to the PH mall and bought my daughter a purse we had promised her if we won any money. I didn’t win any but Violet did. I decided it would be better if I just paid the money instead of try to win it. I never win. So now my 13 year old daughter has a $138 purse. That’s kind of embarrassing to me. After we found someone for my daughter to hang with at the mall we remembered there was something left on our to- do list so we headed over to the MGM to win 2 million dollars on the Lion’s Share slot. It was right where I thought it would be (thank you LVA) but it was out of order so I am not a millionaire. The slots at MGM were really tight so we decided to leave. By that time we were way inside MGM so we decided to try out the monorail. We go there just in the nick of time to catch the last ride of the night. As we were walking to the monorail my daughter called and asked me to swing by the Sbarro’s on the strip and get her some breadsticks. Luckily for her, there is a 24 hour Sbarro’s inside Bally’s where the monorail was dropping us off. Got to bed at 2.
Day 8: Spent the morning packing up and had housekeeping knocking on our door at 8am asking when we were leaving. I told her 11 even though we planned on leaving earlier than that. That was irritating to me so I took all my leftover water bottles that I had planned on leaving for her with me. That ended up backfiring because I forgot they were in my bag and tried to take them through airport security. I didn’t get in any trouble though. They just threw them away. After we checked out we still had one Groupon left to use. It was for Pampas Brazilian Grill. We had two surf and turf buffet lunches for 28 bucks. My daughter and I had that and Violet had just a salad bar and ate any of the meat we didn’t want. They called the meal “the parade of meats” and the waiters kept bringing meat out on a big stick and giving us slices of it. All the meat was really good but I think the salad bar should have had more build your own salad ingredients. It was still a really good, quick meal. I highly recommend it. After lunch we made it over to NY/NY to finally get on the roller coaster. I didn’t go because last time I went on it it beat me up pretty bad. Violet did and she ended up with a migraine later. We spent the rest of the afternoon wandering NY/NY and gassing up the rental car. I’m glad I didn’t opt for the prepaid gas option. I was tempted to because the gas was so much cheaper there than at home but it would have been $47 to do that and I only had to put in $20. The flight home was pretty turbulent and the landing was the hardest I’ve ever experienced but I honestly think I have overcome my fear of flying. I wasn’t worried at all.
So that’s pretty much the end of my report. I do have some random thoughts and I think they will be easier to add here than insert them in the appropriate sections. Our room at PH was really clean. It over looked the rooftop, Harmon Tower, and you could see the NY coaster in the distance. The rooms are very dark. Abby Lee Miller Dance Company was not at the competition. Neither was Candy Apple’s Dance Studio. I was hoping they would be there. This trip I did something I normally would not do. I bought a Styrofoam cooler and kept it stocked with bottled water and Red Bull. I also kept a lot of snack food and protein bars in the room. Apparently, growing kids like to eat and one meal a day doesn’t cut it for them. Gary from Teen Mom seemed like a pretty nice guy. We sat and played with him for about an hour. If anyone asked for a photo with him he obliged. When I first started this report I thought I’d only fill a page or two. It took way longer than I expected so I hope someone reads it.
