I love the Internet! I feel it was created by God especially for people like me who crave instant information, constant innovation, and continual change (or more correctly, are flighty). According to my friends and colleagues, I change my mind more often than anyone else they know, especially about small things, so having a very fluid, very instant, up-to-the-minute research/communication means is wonderland indeed. Everything is permanent, but nothing is constant on the Internet.
There is also the adage, fittingly from Lewis Carroll: If you don’t know where you are going, any road will get you there.
So it’s within these two croquet wickets that I’m drawing up the Master Plan for LVA’s newest blog: Living Local (and Large at Low Cost) in Las Vegas, which should get me through at least the next few months.
This blog begins with my personal journey in learning (and then conveying) everything I can about living a full yet affordable life in Las Vegas. What are Las Vegas’ unique advantages and disadvantages a well-informed resident has to be aware of and try to overcome? I will draw on experience (living both here and elsewhere) and specific research.
But I’m not the only voice in the Las Vegas Valley — and I’m looking for other contributors to this blog who ideally aren’t single, over 60, and living in the northwest part of the city. Hopefully by the new year, Living Local will feature valuable information from many voices. (If you’re interested in being a part of this blog – for which there’s minor compensation – please send a note to [email protected]).
The purpose of this blog is to give readers the tools for having an optimal Las Vegas local experience that they can make their own based on personal circumstances, wants, and needs. It will not be a comprehensive restaurant or entertainment guide to Las Vegas; many fine sources for that information are already produced by Huntington Press and others. I do plan to thoroughly examine books, publications, websites, and broadcast media and will recommend at the end of each post any specific sources used in its compilation.
As the author of the first book ever written on players clubs, I thoroughly believe that effective use of gambling skills can enhance the Las Vegas experience for both tourists and locals. However, this isn’t a better-gaming blog. It’s a living-large blog. Enough resources created by my good friends Bob Dancer and Jean Scott cover playing at an optimal level and getting the most benefits possible, and I plan to make full use of those resources whenever possible.
Finally, though this blog is entitled “Living Local (and Large at Low Cost) in Las Vegas,” it hopefully will offer suggestions or spark ideas for anyone living large (and at low cost) anywhere in the U.S.A. and beyond.
Next: The Five Most Important Las Vegas Neighborhoods
Never miss another post
Advantages: 24-hour everything. Lots to do. It’s s big city. Lots of job opportunities. Gambling, though I could also list that under “disadvantages.” Generally low taxes. Medium-high cost of living, but definitely cheaper than California.
Disadvantages: Unless you’re from Phoenix, the summers will seen excruciating. No real sense of cohesion or community (despite that “Vegas Strong” blather). A corrupt, brutal, and inefficient police force. Terrible schools. A city full of smokers, drug users, and transient lowlifes. Traffic approaching strangulation levels. Cost of living, particularly housing, skyrocketing.
The mitigating or exacerbating factor is where you are. If you’re around Summerlin or Green Valley, Vegas seems nice: a pleasant modern artifact of American suburbia and even a bit of scenery. If you’re near downtown, Nellis, North Vegas, East Vegas, etc. it seems like Detroit.
Oh, and if the internet had been created by God (and if God actually existed), then it would work a lot better, and Google would not exist. Neither would spam.
Kevin,
Not living in Vegas, and only juding the LVPD via the show COPS, why is the department corrupt?
I like visting las vegas I like being there and doing things. I enjoy going to the resturants that are more for the locals . Thank You for your view on the vegas area .