Jose? No way!

Just got up. And I just noticed that Jimmy Poon's Artificial Stupidity (AS) engine created the wrong artwork for the trip report.

Day 2 - Sunday August 23, 2026

I got on the horn with Jimmy Poon to get this fixed ASAP. He is very apologetic. I might fire him. Except he's a volunteer. On with the report from yesterday.

Staying on Eastern time makes it so much easier to adjust when I get home. That's not gonna happen this trip. I got to bed late late late and woke up around 6:30 Vegas time. I'm not only retired, I'm on vacation. I'll deal.

And due to poor planning, I had no morning coffee in my room, even though El Gustavo is in the house. I have the Portable Beaker. The cable. The coffee. The cone. The filters.

No mug.

The lightweight one I travel with is in Florida.

So I did my writing and then trundled down to breakfast at Market Street.

I ordered my usual two over hard with sausage, hash browns, and wheat toast. 

I suppose I could even re-use the same photo of breakfast over and over each day, it's always the same order.

But because I'm in a good mood, here's the actual breakfast. Delish!

Here's another example of why I love the Cal. I left my room and no more than 5 minutes later, I was seated at my table, had my order taken, and was served coffee. That can happen when it's not busy!

What a view!

Time to get to some gambling!! Up on the mezzanine, I had a date with some video Keno.

First, though, I took the traditional photo for YoLeven of me in front of what used to be named the Maile room - the infamous Maile room, site of the only place in Vegas I've been thrown out of. (See Curse of the Single Lonely Diner Table).

I played through a hundy on video Keno and deep into my second one, I found some money. Nice!

That put me up some on the day, a nice feeling. I wandered the Cal playing this and that.

There have been so many downgrades and changes here. No more coin droppers of any kind, although the dollar 9/6 Jacks machines remain for now. No Treasure Chest. Lots of slant tops gone. Various quiet downgrades including Pinchy and Flashy. Short pay Jacks and Bonus on those machines.

And I noticed that the pop machine in the hall is $4 now - last time it was $3. This is modern Vegas, chipping away at value.

It took a while before I found a quad to celebrate.

Good ole Boner Deluxe!

A little walkabout was in order - obviously, I needed a mug - but not too long a one, as it was 317 degrees outside. I headed across the corner and went into Binions.

There is now an exciting 80% off blowout sale there. Put a pin in that!

As I walked through I spotted a sign.

Pulled pork from their smokers, fries, and a drink - all for $7.77?

Sounded great! I went to Binion's Cafe and they seated me at... The Single Lonely Diner table.

Yup, that's my table there. I pondered whether I was meant to sit facing the exit door.

It's always exciting to find a deal and this were one, baby. The pulled pork was delicious with a real deep smoky flavour. A bit dry maybe, but the sauce made up for that. I had the huge drink, a mound of fresh hot fries, and some house made (I think) pickles and I was in tastebud heaven for a full 90 seconds.

Definitely worth a try!

At the Golden Nugget, I poked around trying to find an ancient Inching Diamonds machine with a huge progressive on it. It's like a mini Lion's Share machine from days gone by - a progressive that has not been hit probably for decades.

I found it and my $20 donation bought me quite a bit of playing time.

The cheapest mug at the ABC store was $6. Sold! - along with some other supplies such as milk and a $100,000 bar to spur me on.

Back at the Cal, I needed to do some serious coin in. I started with triple play, tried some 50 cent Deuces, and finally settled in for a 1,000 hand run at dollar Jacks.

That mini-marathon put me at even for the day. Not bad!!!

I bet $40 on the Roughriders to cover against the BC Lions and watched the end of the game in my room. It was a terrible bet.

Meanwhile, BobbyG and the lovely Mrs. G. were due to make their way to Main Street in a while, having dined in very high fashion at Aria's Carboner.

It was getting on and I got hungry, so I grabbed chicken and waffles (amazing!) at the Market Street Cafe, and then went over to join BobbyG at the Boar's Head bar.

Jose took good care of us, but the gambling was awful. I lost $100 at video poker, and then flailed about trying dollar Jacks, dollar Bonus, and then 50 cent Double Double, all to no avail.

Bobby managed to pull out a decent quad at the end to get him even for the session, but I had no such luck. Not a single hit of any kind in the couple of hours we were there.

I did have time to re-acquaint myself with the brass elephant heads that hold the brass rail to the bar. Most people don't notice these.

Fuck you, Elmer, you owe me $400!!!!

So that puts me down $720 for the trip. An unfortunate evening turn of events, given I'd stayed even all day long.

Jimmy Poon just sent the corrected artwork for the trip report. Thanks, Jimmy.

Air Fried Flusher

Vegas is hot. Scorching. 109F or so when I landed. I strolled off the plane, took the obligatory photo, and immediately did something stupid.

Day 1 - Saturday August 22 - part 2

The long long escalators descend into the Tram Devil's Pit of Despair.

As everyone does, I gazed at the aluminum and rather pointy model airplanes lining the slippery slope between the down and up escalators and ponders just what sort of rectal damage they would do if one were to be so foolish as to slide down the slippery slope, which is the whole reason they are there.

At the bottom, what did I see? Throngs of people jammed in the line-up for the Terminal 1 tram - and nobody going to Terminal 3.

I thought, "Why, I'll just go to Terminal 3 and get a rental car shuttle from there, skipping the incredible crowding of Terminal 1." Seemed brilliant at the time.

The tram came, I got off, and entered the ghost town of an almost empty Terminal 3. Great! Walked to the north end and went outside. Sweet Jesus on a Weber, it was hotter than hades out there.

Oh my Gawwd it was hot. The shuttle area was deserted, and the wind was blowing. And that makes it 10 times worse.

Also, no shuttle.

Also, no shuttle after 5 minutes.

Also, no shuttle after 10 minutes.

I beeped three times and turned myself around 180 degrees.

The stupid fucking shuttle took 20 minutes to arrive and I was toast.

If you've experienced this, you know of what I speak. If not, I hope I used my words effectively to relate the skin-blistering dessicating horror heat wind of Vegas in the summer.

Aboard, I messaged the lovely Mrs. G and let her know I'd be at Silverton soon.

Hertz hadn't sent any messages about the car, and I had a hell of a time logging into their app. But in retrospect, I was a good hour and a half before the time I'd said I would arrive.

The counter Sheila sorted me out and I actually got the car I'd booked, which manifested itself as a black Volvo SC 60 with a stupid indecipherable combo push stick push button transmission, and a similarly indecipherable key fob.

But I'll tell ya, this baby has only 800 miles on it, it's comfy and quiet and goes like hell. Drives really nicely.

Silverton was an easy find - left on Las Vegas Blvd to Blue Mountain, and then follow everyone else going to Silverton.

I parked, got in touch with Mrs. G, and we located each other away from Bobby. And then the Big Moment was finally at hand.

I phoned him and sang in sweet dulcet tones, "Let's all go to the lobby, let's all go to the lobby..." as I walked around the corner.

Big hugs all around! He was pretty surprised to see me and it was all worthwhile.

Mission accomplished.

We sat at the bar for an hour or so and shot the shit while I had my first video poker action of the trip on  Double Super Slippery Frying Flipping Fracking Times Pay. It went well for a while but in the end, ate my hundy, save for a few cents which I donated to Mr. G.

I wished him luck.

He didn't need it.

The lad went on a tear after I left, savvily bumping the denoms up as he hit Aces upon Aces, finishing with a $4000 hand pay. Well done, Bobby!

Meanwhile, I parked at the Cal and checked in.

I walked into my room and HOLY BURNING HELL - the room was HOT AUGUST NIGHTS HOT.

For some inexplicable, stupid, asinine reason, the thermostat was set to 86 degrees. In HEAT mode!

Well. I made some quick adjustments, loaded the safe, and of course, I had no other option but to go and gamble in the casino.

It was a pretty quiet session. I played $100 on dollar Jacks and lost it.  Put in another and finally got my first quad of the trip.

Eventually I played through all of that and tried $20 on 50 cent Double Double. Got a second quad and played that down to about $40.

I switched to dollars and got Ace Ace Ace Three Thud. One card off of $2000. It was BobbyG's night, not mine.

It was a great day all around, and the damage wasn't too bad for the first night -  $320 down.

 

 

The Pre-Walk of Shame

Breakfast buffet at the hotel - $24.95. I don't think so, you mooks. Because I have lounge access at the airport.

Day 1 - Saturday August 22 - part 1

It was BobbyG Flambe Surprise day at last! And a beautiful morning in Toronto.

I felt like utter crap, but one has to get on with it, and after a long shower, that's what I did.

My flight was scheduled for 1:00 pm so I would have a fairly leisurely morning until then.

I packed up all my stuff, and walked over to the airport. No shuttle, no taxi, no bullshit, just a nice five minute stroll.

Security was pretty easy. I have Nexus and Precheck, plus I am Internet Faymus. Still, they always rip apart certain things for a hand check. But I know this and pull out the stuff they want to see.

The Portable Beaker kettle dealy. (The Little Giant is back in Florida.)

The 250g package of ground coffee.

The CPAP.

But it went quick, and the border dude didn't give me a hassle and before I knew it, I was up the elevator, ready to give the finger to Air FU Canada.

Normally, First Class domestic travel in the States does not get you lounge access. But because I'm crossing an international border, I get to use the lounge. United is a Star Alliance partner with AC. And United doesn't have their own lounge in Toronto.

And so it was that I waltzed into the Maple Leaf Lounge, ready to ravage them for all the calories I could.

There were definitely some breakfast foods and I made the most of it!

To really slam it home that I was the boss and a 'somebody', I took a chocolate chip cookie out of the lounge when I left. That's how Flusher rolls.

I boarded the flight to Chicago and off we went.

There was some turbulence due to a transient high El Nino low pressure front trough zone or some shit.

The transient high El Nino low pressure front trough zone.

We arrived in Chicago and taxied for about three hours, which is typical for the O'hareport. 

I was a bit disoriented in the terminal, but everything fell into place. The Bank of America was on my way to Terminal B, so I did the Pre-Walk of Shame.

The big tunnel led me to my gate which was across from the United lounge. Couldn't be easier.

I beeped in no problem at all and - holy moly, what an upgrade from the sad sack Maple Leaf Lounge.

I wasn't hungry, particularly, and it didn't matter. Look at what was on offer!

There was whole other bar of salad and other stuff, not pictured, and of course a full bar.

The flight to Vegas boarded on time, but it took forever to get off the ground. As we took off I counted 11 planes waiting to leave - the line we'd just waited in.

They changed the plane to an older 737 so the wifi was useless. No matter.

I decided to watch a movie - Project Hail Mary - which was quite long and kept me entertained through the flight.

And so did various distractions such as Buffalo Trace on ice, and the delicious meatballs I had for dinner.

There was some incredible cloud art on the way - just super dramatic views.

Before I knew it, we were descending into Vegas.

Which is where I made the stupidest blunder.