Las Vegas

Y'all let me tell you about my experience in Vegas! I recruit physicians for a facility in Mesquite, NV which is about 90 minutes outside of Las Vegas. I love my job and love that I get to travel to so many places and when the opportunity presented itself to go to Vegas I jumped on it! I never had a desire to visit LV but since it is a "work expense", I was open to seeing the city of sin. Y'all I was in the city for 16 hours and what a time it was!

I flew Southwest for the first time and loved the experience! A non-stop flight is a glorious thing! Once landed, I picked up my rental car and headed to the Wynn resort. 

After I parked and made my way into the casino, the smoke hit me right away. The tables were somewhat busy and it felt dark in the casino. I see where you can lose all track of time! I finally made my way to the registersation desk and checked in. On my way to my room, I passed a few flower arrangements...

What seemed like a short hike I found the elevators and accidentally got on the wrong set. The resort divides up elevators based on floor numbers. I accidentally got on the wrong set of elevators. Realizing my mistake, I hit the lobby button and had to ride until everyone got to their specific floor. Well y'all this one girl got on and she had on a tiny black pleated skirt with marijuana leaves all over it. I thought to myself, you know I haven't see that in Limited, Belk's, or Dillard's fall collection! Feeling completely green (no pun intended) I exited and got on the correct set of elevators and made my way to my room.

The room was really really nice and can I just say it has made me think about our future home. I had to press one button and the curtains opened. I pressed one button and all the lights came on. In the bathroom I had a phone and a TV. I'm sure  Stamper will roll his eyes when I tell him these would be worthy expenses in a future home!

I called mom and Jace and told them I had arrived safely. Now I'm not going to lie I was a little overwhelmed by the size of the city--it's big. I was hesitant to go and explore the strip but I thought when am I going to be back here? I ate dinner in the casino and made my way to the strip. I wish I could had seen the dancing fountains but did see several iconic resorts like the palazzo, trump tower, the mirage, etc. 

Now no trip to Vegas is completing without a little gambling. I don't gamble a lot simply because I like to keep my money but I took a $20 and found a slot machine. I inserted the bill and really wanted some instructions to pop on the screen. There were no instructions. I sat down for 2 minutes and hoped I could strike it rich like Charlie in the chocolate factory!

For two minutes I kept hitting a button labeled 40 credits and then the screen lit up with this...

What do three Grandpa Joe's even mean??? I had absolutely no idea and thought I would just cash out. A ticket printed and it said 

Well I was so excited I had won something!! However I thought there would be some left over change from the $20 and honest to God hit the service button three times and no one came to tell me the machine took my money and I'm very naive to the whole gambling scene. Vegas was created for people like me! I cashed out and was ok with only losing $5.50. I called Stamp and told him of my winning and of course he quickly did the math and corrected me that in fact I didn't win. Little did he appreciate the confusion I had to deal with those two minutes!!

After gambling and seeing the lights of the strip, I headed to my room. My body was two hours ahead and I was ready to call it a night. I can assure you no one who has been to Vegas went to bed as early as I did last night. 

Since I went to bed early when in reality it was my normal bedtime, I got up early. Remember my excitement about the tv in the bathroom well at 5 am I was watching MTV music videos! MTV actually plays music videos at that hour of the day and I thoroughly enjoyed getting ready. The bathroom had a magnifying mirror and ladies lets be honest that thing is a dangerous tool. You think you look fine and then BAM! you find hairs you didn't know existed! Well I took care of all that maintenance this morning with MTV on in the background!

The drive to Mesquite was rather flat. It truly looks like a desert and the largest things are the telephone poles. It also looks like Keith Morrison from Dateline could appear at any minute and tell you a story of how a spouse killed the other spouse for insurance money and disposed of the body in this region. 

The hospital visit went really well and it helps me when talking with the doctors after I have seen the community. I'm happy to have had the experience to see Las  Vegas but I'm a southerner at heart and to me there is no comparison to the south! I'm ready to get home, manually open my own blinds, and the only betting I plan on doing is with Stamper on who will be eliminated on Dancing with the Stars!