Thursday

Headed to the airport for our 6:15 flight – always nervous headed to Charlotte-Douglas Airport, but we managed to quickly find a spot in the Long Term 1 parking lot and a shuttle arrived right as we got our bags to the curb. Checked one bag ($15, thanks for the nickle & dime attack US Airways. And thank you for the $15 checking fee to bring the bag home) and we hopped on our non-stop flight to Sin City!

You know it’s going to be a good trip when your bag is one of the first to enter the baggage claim area, and the taxi line is pretty short. Emily and I were quickly en route to Planet Hollywood. Now, if your bag coming off the baggage claim line quickly is a good sign (Third bag off the plane? Awesome!), what kind of a sign is a wrong-way driver while heading to your hotel? I’m not sure which takes precident, but the cabbie laid on the horn and the driver quickly got the point and headed off onto the shoulder. Number of times Death has been dodged: 1.

At the check-in counter, I was able to slip the guy at the front desk a $20 and we were upgraded from a Hollywood Hip room to a Resort Room (wondering the best way to do this? When they ask for your ID and a Credit Card for incidentals, put a folded twenty in-between). I tried to press on for more, mentioning that we were celebrating our recent engagement – the PH had been running a promotion saying “The Drinks are on Us” where you get a free bottle of booze from the ABC store every day of your stay, but because I hadn’t registered specifically for that feature, I was shot down in my attempts to get the free drinks. Oh well, can’t win em all.

The check-in area at the Planet Hollywood is nicely laid out and very sleek looking. The people behind the counter, however, were wearing some sort combination of purple shirts and this crushed-fake-velvet looking black jackets which were looking pretty threadbare – it has the effect of looking pretty slick from across the room but once you’re face to face, you worry that the clerk might hit you up for your spare change in addition to your registration information.

Our view from our Planet Hollywood room.

After our dealings, we made our way to the room, which would up overlooking the Planet Hollywood Pool Area and had views of the Bellagio Fountains, part of Caesar’s Palace, and Paris. We had a very comfortable King sized bed, flat screen TV/Armoir, two lounge chairs with a coffee table between them in the bedroom. The bathroom (which, upon entering the room felt like a sauna, but a few hours of having the A/C on cooled it back down) was very spacious with a glass and tile shower next to a stand alone bathtub. His and her sinks were located on opposite sides of the bathroom.

The weirdest thing about the room was also one of PH’s signature design touches – each room at the Planet Hollywood containes movie memorabilia. I came into the room expecting this, but for some reason I never expected that we would be in the “What’s Eating Gilbert Grape” Suite – complete with Juliette Lewis’s outfit from the movie, images of a young Johnny Depp and a very young Leonardo DiCaprio in addition photots of them with the walrus-sized Mama character. I have never actually seen this movie and, somehow, I think that I was better off in the room not knowing what was going on in the scenes that were playing out on our walls.Only other complaint about the room was the lack of drawers. I like taking everything out of my suitcase on a longer stay and setting up home – but between Emily and I – two drawers really wasn’t enough space to get everything out. At least the closet was plenty big enough for our hanging stuff.

Yep, we had this picture large and framed in our "Gilbert Grape" room

Afterwards (since it was getting a little late for the two of us) we decided to tough it out by going to walk the Planet Hollywood floor and find something to eat. Neither of us were really impressed by the casino at Planet Hollywood, we played a couple slot machines and walked around looking at the different tables. We failed completely to find a slot machine game that Emily enjoyed playing at the Turningstone Casino in Utica, NY – “Pick Your Forture”. So we tried to find something that was almost as good (although I don’t think anything ever lived up to that billing). The Sportsbook in the PH was pretty nice with a good number of TVs, decent bar area, and friendly people working the book. I made a few mental notes on the upcoming weekend’s games.

The food at Pink's? Fast, Delicious and a good deal in Las Vegas.

We also stopped by Pink’s, which had recently opened in Planet Hollywood – apparently there are only two Pink’s in the US – I think the other one is somewhere in LA? And this one would up being very tasty and not too pricy. We both tried the hotdogs and had some fries and some beers. Definitly a great spot, especially with the outside seating where you could watch the weird world of Vegas walk by.

Finally, we started to feel the need to get some sleep, so it was off to bed to prepare for the next day.

Until then, quick beer pick for you, if you’re in Asheville, NC, head over to the Wedge Brewery in the River Arts District. They have a couple delicious beers available straight from the source in their tasting room.

This formula worked out to a complete lack of deals. The best I found for our stay (September 24-27, Thursday Night through Saturday Night) was $173.32 a night at Mandalay Bay (ALMOST a WHOLE penny cheaper per night than it was at Priceline or Expedia, but even that small difference tells me that one shouldn’t always assume that the third party sites have the best deal).

Defeated here, I turned to Hotwire, and saw that there were some highly rated hotels at better prices. The problem is that these Hotwire deal hotels were listed without a name – you only knew where you were staying AFTER you completed your booking.

Thanks to a few minutes of thinking about this, I Googled ‘Identify Hot Wire Hotels’ and soon found myself at www.betterbidding.com. If you haven’t been, this site takes booking information users voluntarily leave and then is able to give you a very good idea about which hotel is which on the Hotwire Deals page. For example, the Hotwire page will state that a certain hotel has a certain set up amenities. These amenities will differ from hotel to hotel. I was quickly able to determine that the 4-star rated hotel in the Central Strip of Las Vegas was the Planet Hollywood, one that wasn’t on my radar before. The rate? $139 a night. I went ahead and booked it, but my deal hunting didn’t stop.

Hotwire also has what is called a “Double your Difference” policy. If, within 48 hours, you find a lower advertised rate available to the public, you can submit this rate to the Hotwire team and they will refund you twice the difference. Google searches weren’t finding anything lower, so I decided I should check the standard social networking sites – I struck gold at Twitter.

Planet Hollywood (like many Vegas Casinos) has a Twitter account. And a quick search of posts from the Planet Hollywood account showed that they had send out a link via Twitter (a Twitter deal, if you will) that posted room rates for less – including rates of $130 a night for the three nights we are going to be in Vegas.

I sent the link to Hotwire, and received a response very quickly (Kudos to Hotwire for that, I was expecting them to ignore the request or wait weeks before responding) that they would honor that price and “Double the Difference” My $139/night hotel stay was now $121 a night. Not dirt cheap by any means, but I think I would up with a great deal at a nice hotel for just a little bit of legwork. Once I return, I’ll post a review of the hotel and the Vegas stay in general.

Until then, I have only one more deal to attempt upon check-in: will slipping the desk clerk a $20 get us upgraded for our stay? I’ll let you know how it goes.

I'd stay in a Caesar's Villa if I could afford it

So my hunt for a Las Vegas deal continues, and so far, the best option seems to still be Priceline or Hotwire. Only problem there is that you’re pretty unsure which hotel you might be staying it. Well, thanks to betterbidding.com a lot of guesswork has been taken out. You can see recent deals that people got for certain dates as well as telling information that helps to identify which hotel you might be bidding on by using clues the sites themselves give you.

Over on eBay, there’s Las Vegas Hookups which has lots of passes you can get for the different clubs in Vegas. I went ahead and purchased a set from this eBay store – I’ll let you know how well the passes work or if they’re worth the spend, but they’re supposed to get you into a “better” line and make it so you don’t have to pay cover at most of these places (some spots will give the lady free cover but make the guy pay).

As for the rest of the day? Who knows…. it’s lazy Saturday, slept in, watched Kirk win a stay at Ceaser’s Palace in Vegas on Twitter:

1st place winners (3rd batch)@paulwaling, @jmoneyallday, @benji08, @theclairemarie & @dkirkward

Maybe I’ll head to the pool, or sit around watching The Dark Knight… have to head to the Home Depot for Father’s Day. The questions is, what to get? But that’s why I love Home Depot, walk around for a little while and you’ll have to decide what NOT to get him (as well as what you can and can’t afford to get for yourself).

Then a little showing of Evil Dead: The Musical at Actor’s Theatre and then we might be headed to Connolly’s on 5th in Charlotte afterward (haven’t decided yet) but they have:

Hunt for a Cure @ Connolly’s
Date: Saturday, June 20, 2009 – 3:00 PM

Hunt for a Cure Charity Event at Connolly’s on Saturday, June 20th starting at 3pm. Pig Pickin, Cornhole Tournament (please email lu.ulma@gmail.com to sign up), Live Band, DJ WoJo, 50/50 Raffle & more… Please email HuntforCure@gmail.com for more information & find out how you can help!

So at least it would be getting a few drinks for a good cause.

All the news for now, perhaps I’ll see you uptown later tonight. You can also follow me on Twitter through: @worldofjay

Until next time…

Hanging out – post celebration – because I finished my MBA!!!!!!! Huzzah! Party! Send me presents! And now that you’ve sent presents, I’ll let you know that MBA in this case stands for Master of Beer Appreciation at Brixx here in Charlotte. Yes, over many months I managed to drink 32 different types of beer as well as attend one “beer event” for Emily and I, it was a pretty delicious beer dinner pairing different Abita beers with some Cajun cooking.

The actual MBA keeps rolling (December 2010 for those who wonder when I’m scheduled to graduate). But for now, I just want to get through this summer session before getting July and most of August off for break – when I’ll be at the Outer Banks for two glorious weeks. I can almost feel the warm sun, the hot sand, the ocean spray and a cool beer….

Ahhhhhhhhhhhh! I just forced myself into a mental image from which I cannot escape. Would school and work notice if I disappeared for the next five weeks?

They would?

Damn.

Well, I’ll try to survive a little while longer. Thursday brings another night of class – maybe I’ll find out my grade on the first test – and that’s all there is. But then – FRIDAY, where I’ll be taking a half-day from work, dropping off Tarps at Kelly’s (for Pops in the Park) and relaxing for the rest of the day (and weekend).

So, those of you who are still reading this – kudos. Those of you who aren’t reading this – well, you suck. Although you’d never know it. Still, you do. Because I promise it will get more interesting here.

And, those of you following my Twitter feed below – any tips on good deals for a mid-October trip to Las Vegas, let me know! Until next time…