Return From Laughlin

My second out-of-town trip report this week – an unusually busy travel month for us!

This trip to Laughlin, however, not like the 4-day visit to Reno via jet, was a short overnight visit via the Frugal Plum, our trusty little PT Cruiser.   We had several goals.  The main one was to get my driver’s license renewed at a DMV office where we wouldn’t have to set aside a whole day to wait in line.  We usually do all our renewals by mail, but I had recently reached the old-woman age when Nevada wanted to be sure I could still see and wasn’t too feeble to operate a vehicle.  I could have gone to the trouble of seeing a doctor and optometrist and having them sign documents which I could have mailed in.  But since we go to Laughlin every month or so anyway, it seemed easier to do it in person at the DMV office there, a 20-minute in-and-out procedure.

I am big on multi-tasking and we rarely go out of the house for personal business without doing some “casino errand.”  Brad usually picks up free play at one or two casinos before stopping to buy groceries.  I plan shopping trips to the mall on a day when we need to play at a casino on the way home.  I try to make doctor appointments on a day of the week I know there will be bonus points at a nearby casino.  If we have a medical problem, we don’t stop at a casino on the way to the emergency room, but I must confess that several times we have made a quick stop to pick up soon-expiring free play on our way home after Brad has been dismissed after a hospital stay.

So the DMV visit in Laughlin was easy to justify because Harrah’s had sent us a couple of offers, totaling $650, to pick up.  Plus we had just a few reward credits left to earn for both of us to reach the Seven Stars tier level for another year.

People ask us if we ever play slot machines.  Usually we don’t, but once in while we might if we think a casino is cutting back on offers to those customers who play only video poker.    So this time in Laughlin, we decided we would mix in a little slot play with video poker.  We usually pick a new machine that looks like fun – some of our favorites in the past have been “Texas Tea,” “Wizard of Oz,” and “Sex and the City.”  This time we decided to play penny “Gold Fish” since it seemed like these machines are always full of players and they always seem to be having so much fun.

As is our custom, we set a limit for these forays into purely-entertainment machine territory.  In this case, we set a $200 limit, hoping that would last long enough to generate enough points to show that we were a “well-rounded” casino customer.  Well, we lasted about an hour, thanks to one $100 jackpot that kept us going longer than we thought we would.  But we finally lost our original investment of $200.  However, we had achieved our purpose – and we really had fun.  I usually think of slots being boring, but these new bonusing ones like “Gold Fish” have  frequent enough second-screen fun bonuses that we were thoroughly entertained the whole hour!

It was an enjoyable visit.  We had plenty of food coupons to let us overeat.  We watched two in-room movies for free, compliments of our Seven Star tier status. (You really didn’t expect me to pay for them, did you?  Have you seen the prices they charge these days?)  Both the movies we watched were ones that were on our must-see list and we were not disappointed.   The “Wall Street” sequel might not be quite as engrossing as the first one, but Brad didn’t fall asleep during it, so that is high praise in his book!  I knew he wouldn’t fall asleep in “Secretariat” –  he was an avid horse-racing fan back then and remembered all the details of that era.

We took the long way back home so we could traverse the new bridge on the Hoover Dam bypass.  And then we stopped at Penny’s in the Galleria Mall to buy Brad a pair of shoes.  The kind he wanted was on sale at $10 off and I sweet-talked a young salesman and he gave me an extra $10 coupon discount even though that sale wasn’t to begin until tomorrow. 

Then we stopped at Ellis Island to pick up $25 in bounce-back cash.  And finally stopped at Tuscany for the weekly free gift.  It was “your choice” of gifts today but all the good stuff was gone time we got there.  Oh well, two serving dishes go to the garage, a gift for someone who actually cooks and “serves.”  (I don’t think I need them for casino restaurant leftovers!)

We’re home now.  But in just another week, we will be traveling again, to Columbus, GA, to spend the holidays with the Frugal Princess family.