If You've Got the Money, Honey, I've Got the Time

Spring 2014

by Lefty Frizzell

If you got the money honey I got the time

We'll go honky tonkin' and we'll have a time

We'll make all the night spots, dance, romance and dine

If you got the money honey, I got the time.

I was sliding into a depressed funk this Spring when it was becoming clear to me that I wouldn't have the funds to do my usual "Springtime in Vegas" trip.
Even though the CET people had been sending me all kinds of "return to Vegas" incentives, I just didn't think it was going to happen.

 But then they sent me the clincher...free rooms and SEINFELD tickets. 
My husband has always been a huge Seinfeld fan.

I thought maybe, just maybe, he could be persuaded to take a Vegas trip to see him.  
Sure enough, husband said "Book it!" 
With my husband paying for the transportation etc...and all my free rooms, food and show tickets.....a Spring Trip was now on!
I flew to the computer and set it all up.

I have a bad foot so my poor husband was essentially used as a human cane all week. 

It is frustrating , but you have to play the hand you are dealt, right?

On to the trip.....

March 15 to 22nd, 2014

Saturday March 15

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My husband Mario and I flew Spirit nonstop out of Detroit. People diss that airline  but once again we had a fine flight with pleasant service. Ditto on the return flight.

I realized halfway to the airport that I had forgotten my American cell phone at home.  Darn it. That meant I wouldn't be able to get in touch with some of the people I was hoping to contact.
The wayward phone..right where I left it.

We  arrived in Vegas around 1 pm and took a $9 Showtime shuttle down to the Four Queens, our home for four nights. The first two nights were comped and the last two were $25 a piece.

I had asked for a quiet room and I lucked out. They gave me a room at the end of the hall, on the 12th floor, facing the Golden Nugget. We had no noise issues at all. We had no issues of any kind. The room was clean, comfy and well maintained.

Mario didn't feel like a buffet so I suggested we go over to Triple 7 at Main Street Station. I was under the impression that it was happy hour, but I didn't realize that happy hour was only Mon-Fri. 

Anyhow I really enjoy their quesadillas and was happy to have them again. 


 Afterwards we played for an hour at MSS because I always want to take a run at their Loose Deuce machines. This time this availed me nothing so we walked back over to Fremont. 
We tried the ice cream at Dari Delite at Binions.  Pretty bland tasting.  But they have a seating area on Fremont street and it is always fun to watch the crazies go by. 

Mario was thrilled to find Pirate Woman hanging around outside of Binion's.  He finally got his picture taken with her. 
He can now die a happy man. We wandered back to the Four Queens to play some more and have a few drinks.  I tried the progressive machines outside of Magnolia's.....no hits. 
I tried the bartops...nothing. 
We gave up and were back in the room before ten.

Sunday March 16

As usual, we were victims of the time change and wide awake at 4 am.  We laid around till 7, when it seemed appropriate to get up. 

My drippy nose had turned into a stuffy nose and a scratchy throat. Crap!   You wait all year for your Vegas trip and then you get sick in the first 24 hours???

We walked down to the Art Bar at the Downtown Grand.  I am not sure if this area is only meant for hotel guests or not.  But we were quiet and only drank one cup of coffee...lol. The Grand's wifi is for guests only and you must login with your room number, so we couldn't do that.  But we were able to connect to some free wifi from that location so we were happy. 

After updating the world on our activities we went back to the room and locked up our appliances. Then we continued over to the Fremont for a BOGO buffet. (LVA) After eating we wandered through the shops continuing the eternal quest for shirts with collars and pockets. None were located. Next we headed for Walgreen's because ever since I landed my nose had been bothering me. I purchased some meds and took some. We continued our walk down to the Plaza because I was trying to locate a board friend, Tania, to give her something.  I had the spelling of her last name off by one letter and they told me she wasn't there. However she WAS there, so I was disappointed that we never got to connect . We headed back towards Binion's and had our picture taken with the Million dollars....again. We played at Binion's until it was ready. We went back to the room for a rest at noon and wound up sleeping till 3pm. We played from 3 to 5 then went for dinner at the D's coffee shop because I had a ten dollar off coupon.  I had a French Dip and it was yummy. Would definitely eat there again.  (The bill was $28....minus the $10.) I was curious about trying to catch the free LV wifi on Fremont Street so I brought my Ipad to the out door bar at the Four Queens. There is a one drink minimum so we each ordered a $9 drink. I was going to order something girly, but my husband said  "No..you need whiskey for your cold!" So I had a Crown and Coke instead.  I thought the price was a bit steep until I got the drink. It was a huge tumbler and at least half of it was Crown!  It was the strongest drink I have ever been served in a bar. But the Vegas Gods must have known I needed it...because as soon as I drank it, my nose issues disappeared and I was fine the rest of the trip. That outdoor bar was a fun place to sit that night. There was an Irish band performing on the stage in front of us and a bunch of dance-challenged drunks attempting to jig as the floor show. I FACETIMED my son Mike out in Calgary. We could see each other...but we couldn't hear each other.  He got a good laugh out of it. (I think he thought his parents were tipsy!) We went back inside and played until 10 pm. Still no premium hands in sight.   Monday, March 17 We were up by 7 am and headed out to the Art Bar again. This was our usual routine every day we were downtown. It is an easy walk to the Grand, even for a gimpy person. We put our appliances back in the room and decided to use the LVA coupon for breakfast at the Golden Nugget this morning. It was yummy as always and for only 11.08 for both of us, a huge bargain. We walked over to Binion's to check out the Elvis display but we were too early, so we played VP for a while until they opened.  The display is poorly lit so it is hard to read all the plaques. Is is sad to me to see any of the "King's" things in such a shoddy show.  I think all of his belongings should be at Graceland or somewhere more upscale than this show is. We wandered down to the El Cortez area to have a peek atContainer Park. The most interesting thing about the Park was the Praying Mantis, but I didn't get to see him breathe fire unfortunately. The BBQ smelled good...but other than that there was nothing here that would make me want to return. Stopped into El Cortez for a minute to play my $10 coupon.We went back to the room for another nap.   (I have never napped so much in my life.)

I slept till 3pm  then went to play at a 4 Q's bar. 

 I think there was a pimp and some of his employees next to me.  The girls kept disappearing and then reappearing about 15 minutes later.
They made for some interesting people watching but I had no luck at my game.
I had earned a $10 off coupon for the Binion's cafe (I love how easy those are to get through your play there.) so we ate dinner there. We ended up eating there three times this trip and every meal was good, cheap and fast.

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Tuesday, March 18 Off to the Art Bar again, first thing in the morning.  I have to check in on my board and Facebook or I hyperventilate. Earned another one of those Binion's cafe coupons so we ate breakfast there. It was only at this point that I discovered by talking to the desklings that I had other comps that I could use for meals by just swiping their card. Who knew?  Apparently not me.  So breakfast was on Binion's. Mario's main objective today was to find a decent place to watch the Detroit /Toronto hockey game. He figured the D would HAVE to have the Detroit game on and he was right. So he spent several hours over there watching the game.  I stayed at the 4 Q's earning my keep. Dinner was at Binion's again. Hey..it is free.  Let's not look a gift horse in the mouth. I had the pulled pork sandwich and Mario had the steak and both meals were good.We bought some ice cream at the 4 Qs and were in bed by 9pm. Their ice cream was much tastier than Dari Delite's at Binions.

Wednesday March 19

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I hate leaving downtown, but it is time to move over to Paris.  One last dash to the Art bar to update the world.  We had muffins and juice at Dunkin Doughnuts for breakfast.

Checked out of the 4 Queens and grabbed a cab.  She took the surface streets and the price was $21.00.  I was happy that Diamond check-in let us have our room at 10 am.  They gave me the nicest room I have ever had at Paris. Two bed Red room, 28th floor, fountain view, middle of the building so not far from the elevator, and it had those curved windows that I like.  It was perfect. It even had an empty minibar fridge that we could use.

When my husband and I did a trip together in 2012 I was surprised to learn that he wanted to go somewhere and shoot a machine gun.  This is so not my thing, and as far as I knew it had never been his either.  I was even more surprised when he told me this trip that he wanted to do it again!  So....back we went to the Gun Store on Tropicana.  This time it was less expensive because they now run a shuttle and will pick you up and return you to your hotel for free.  The shuttle guy, Dave was super nice. He made the whole experience more pleasant.  Mario shot two different guns this time. Don't ask me what they were...I can't remember the names. 

The shuttle guy was kind enough to drop us off at Bellagio and save me some steps. We had a MyVegas buffet for our lunch.  Excellent as always.  Mario was surprised when I told him I was earning free food for us by playing a game. We walked back to the room and took another nap.  Our sink was running a little slow so I asked for someone to fix it. He came right away and fixed it in five minutes. 

We went downstairs to play around 6 pm.  I made a beeline for Bally's because there is a bank of DDB bonus progressives near the poker room that I like.  I was crestfallen when I saw that they had taken out the old machines and replaced them with new ones. That usually means that they won't hit as well...and they didn't.  But I did get a few smaller four of a kinds out of them and one decent one.My only good hand this trip.
We had missed dinner so I was pretty hungry by 10 pm so I grabbed some pizza at the Pizza place and took it up to the room.

Thursday, March 20

Woke up around 7 am. I went downstairs to cafe Belle Madelaine but their darn WIFI wasn't working. Got two muffins and two juices for twice the price we paid downtown and brought them up to the room. (paid with points) 

 We just stayed in the room until 1 pm, which is a good way to conserve money.  

We were heading down to Harrah's to get the free Diamond show tickets for the Million Dollar Quartet for that night. We got in a cab to get down there painlessly.  
The cab driver pulled into the left hand lane to exit Paris. 
I said "Why are you going the wrong way? Harrah's is to the right."

He said "Oh I have to go down here and do a U turn." 

Which was complete BS 
and I let him know I knew it was BS.  
It only jacked up the price by about 3 bucks so I chose not to argue with him and ruin my day. But jeez....that kind of behavior is annoying!

We picked up our tickets then I brought Mario over to the Piano bar to see Big Elvis.  I have been wanting to see him forever and I knew Mario would enjoy him as he loves Elvis.  I was disappointed to find out that he doesn't perform while all this March Madness stuff is happening. So much for that plan.

We walked over to Mirage and Mario settled me into the Starbucks there where I used the two hours of free wifi that Mirage provides and he went to play.   At 4 pm we used our two free MyVegas dinner buffets and had a good meal. I especially enjoyed the White Zinfandel that came with it.

After dinner we went back over to Harrah's and played until showtime. I was happy to see that Harrah's still has the old style Buffalo machines that I like.

This is the second time I have seen the Million Dollar Quartet.  This is a show about a day in 1956 when Johnny Cash, Jerry lee Lewis, Elvis and Carl Perkins were all jamming together at Sun Records. When I saw it last year both Kodi and I agreed that their Elvis was the weakest link. They had a new Elvis this time and he was just amazing. He had the look, the sound and the moves, all down pat.  Every one of those performers is extremely talented. This is one of those shows I would see over and over again.

They had seated us right front and center and I guess the performers noticed the huge smile on my face throughout the entire show, so when it came time for Elvis to do his scarf thing he called me up to get a kiss and the scarf. 
 Almost as thrilling as if he had been the real Elvis!
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After the show...even though my dogs were barking, I forced myself to walk home in order to see the High Roller up close and my pretty lights.  We walked through the Imperial Quad and I was startled to see that O'Shea 's is attached to them now and you can walk right through out to the Linq.  The Linq area is very attractive, but I don't see anything that would make me linger there. At least not yet.

This picture makes me laugh.
Translation..."My feet are killing me..take the darn picture!!" lolMario is on those steps...

I will just prop myself up on this garbage can while you take a picture..

Friday March 21

Breakfast this morning was just juice and muffins from Cafe Belle Madelaine again.
We had connected to Paris's internet for the day. One appliance was 14.99. Mario went downstairs to play and I was on the net all morning. 

 Around 12 we went to the pool for a lovely swim. 

We had the hot tub all to ourselves for awhile. Then I went in the pool. I was the only one in the water. All the women around the edges paddling their feet were amazed. 
"How do you do that ?"

"I am Canadian ", I said..."This is warm!"After our swim we went to Burger Brasserie to have some of their delicious burgers.
 (Plus I had a coupon and paid the remainder with points.)

 After eating we walked over to Caesars to pick up our Seinfeld tickets and to play until showtime.  Caesars was complete bedlam.  I have never seen it so crowded and smokey.  It was hard to even get a drink it was so packed with the MM crowd. 

 At one point I asked where the washroom was and was told under the red Poker sign.  So I barged right down there and found myself standing in a full poker room. Pretty sure they don't want me to pee here.So I beat a hasty retreat and located the washrooms next door.

On this day I also made the mistake of forgetting my lipgloss in the room. Now normally you wouldn't think that that was a catastrophe. But I was gone for about 8 hrs. After 4 hours my lips had dried and cracked. After 8 hours I had this red ring around my mouth that looked like a lip injection job gone awry.  

I sure won't make that mistake again!

This was my first time in the Colosseum. It is huge but I expected it to be more lavish for some reason. I guess because of the caliber of stars that play there.  Seinfeld  was fantastic and we both loved the show.

 We walked back to Paris and called it a night.

Saturday March 22

I was extremely reluctant to return to the cold and snow of Ontario.  Part of me just wanted to cling to something stationary and beg them to let me stay.

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The Spirit flight home was on time and smooth as silk. 
We bought a whole bunch of booze at the duty free store to drown our sorrows in,
until we can return to Vegas for another wonderful trip.
Thanks for reading!