Bryce Canyon

Just spent the last two days driving to Bryce and back. It was my first trip there. Feel free to check out a bunch of pics at the following link.

Bryce Pics

Busy Week Off

Just wanted to drop in and update how my week's gone so far. My parents are currently visiting Vegas and staying at South Point. They got in last Tuesday and will be leaving this coming Friday. I took most of that time off work (just had to work one day last Wednesday) and this past week has pretty much been a blur.

One thing of note is that I will soon be what's known as a dual-rate at work. That means that I will be both a dealer AND a floor supervisor at the casino. I'm thinking they'll probably schedule me 2 or 3 times a week on the floor, depending on who's on vacation and whatnot. Due to the lousy timing, I have to wait until after vacation before I officially get trained and I even have to use up some of my precious vacation time to attend Alcohol Awareness training to get a "Tamcard" before I can get my first scheduled floor shift. Since I don't want to wait another damn week with a full dealing schedule, that means I'm going to get that class taken care of tomorrow......which is part of my vacation AND MY BIRTHDAY!!!! Ugh!

Anyway, as I mentioned, my parents are in town. We haven't done much of anything notable yet, except for Saturday and Sunday when Danielle, myself and my mom drove up for an impromptu visit to Zion National Park. We left early Saturday and got back into Vegas about 7pm Sunday night. My dad was not interested in going, but I'm glad my mom wanted to go. She had a very brief, but excellent time at Zion. I'm hoping I can get them both to the Grand Canyon on their next trip out here. The only major annoyance was the heat the past couple of days. I took a long cold shower when we finally got back into the condo a couple hours ago as it feels like I've been perpetually HOT for the past 48 hours! We had plenty of water on us in the park, but the heat it just getting oppressive for me lately. October and then winter can't get here fast enough!

There's not a whole lot planned for the rest of the week. Tuesday night will be spent over at Danielle's parent's house. We have a little tradition now that whenever my parents visit town, all four of the parents and Danielle and myself get together for dinner at their place in Henderson. Last time, Danielle and I cooked for them (braised balsamic chicken, a rainbow salad and french onion soup) and we'll cook again this Tuesday. However, due to a lack of time and frankly, lack of energy, I'm dumbing down the menu this time around and going for an old-fashioned bbq dinner. I have a great and easy way to cook baby back ribs in the slow-cooker and will just compliment them with some baked beans, cole slaw and corn bred muffins. It'll be pretty damn tasty with a lot less work than in the past.

Okay, better get off the blog and get started on this online portion of the tamcard class. I don't want this annoying thing hanging over my vacation any longer than it needs to be!

Mighty Wind

Not much to report. I had an illness a couple weeks ago, my parents are two days away from arriving for over a week and I'll be on vacation at the same time. Tips are disgustingly pathetic at work, so morale is in the crapper and I'm definitely approaching maximum burn-out. However, an interesting tidbit is that I'll soon be a dual-rate at work, meaning I'll be wearing the "suit" as a pit critter a couple days a week instead of dealing every day. The money won't be any/much better, but it'll be a nice break from dealing $5 blackjack for 8 hours a day.

I caught Rush at the MGM Garden Arena Saturday night. Its the second time I've seen them live and I enjoyed Saturday night's show much more than the first time I saw them about a year and a half ago. They really did kick ass! It's been a while since I've heard their Moving Pictures album (years actually) and I forgot how good it is. They played it in its entirety! Only downer is that Jerry Stiller never made an appearance in any of their video screen videos. :-)

Anyway, I rented A Mighty Wind from netflix last week and loved it. I don't think I've ever seen that movie from beginning to end. I'm seriously considering buying the soundtrack. Here's a few youtube videos to give you a taste of the original music from the movie. If you've never seen it, rent it immediately. It's a very solid flick!