2005 Archived Off-topic Reports

[Cienega32]

Damn - I remembering paying my phone bills there long before wiping ink off my fingertips.

But the article also makes it sound like they want to get rid of the places that sell the dice clocks. Shame on them! Don't they realize that those are a national legacy? How many trailer homes in middle Florida are keeping time with those classic pieces of craftsmanship?

I guess the Big O is setting his own after-office table.

"Pour it and they will come..."

[Wastrel]

I choked on this quote from Hizzoner, and spit coffee all over my paper:

"It's going to be a different city in two or three years," Goodman said of the project's potential impact on redevelopment. "I predict, I really do, that when people fly here, get into a cab, and ask the cabby where the action is, they're going to be brought downtown."

He's going to outbid the Can Can? So will they put a bigger dome over it and post two gorillas at the back to kick them down Boulder Highway left with only their Fruit O' The Looms and their spectacles? I must admit, I can easily picture Oscar as the doorman out front collecting $75 cover charges under a twenty story flashing pink neon breast marquee.

http://www.reviewjournal.com/lvrj_ho.../27006076.html

[Wastrel]

The recent downtown discussion got me thinking about what kind of wildlife I really find running loose on the streets around Fremont these days. It's just an opinion, and I freely admit that there is no way to know if my perceptions are accurate. Even if I think I do get around downtown a bit and know some of the characters there better than the average Joe who passes through, sometimes you just see what you want to see.

What I see is an area that has changed a lot in just a few years, and with many of the old rent by the week motels closing, condo towers breaking ground to sell apartments for a million and a half a pop, and Metro frequently jailing the scruffy scufflers for offenses such as jaywalking and littering, I feel it changing even more and faster now and in the next few years. I don't find many IV drug users in that area in recent times (go several miles north or east to the trailer parks for that) but there are still a fair number of crackheads, lunatics, people going through life as a potted plant, and old fashioned garden variety alcoholics who get that way younger and younger these days.

Some may find it hard to believe, but some of the Fremont SWs are tourists of sorts. They come to Vegas alone chauffeured by Greyhound, or in a group with their "uncle/agent" by '72 Cadillac, spending several weeks or so on a kind of working vacation. Some folks really do think staying in the Downtowner or Ambassador Motel is living large in the lap of sophisticated luxury.

But by far the most common variety of street life I see is, as far as I know, a uniquely Vegas species: the video poker or slot machine junky. At least in theory this pathology shouldn't have the same ravages on physical health as other habits, but they do often seem every bit as desperate for a quick buck as anyone on the pipe. I also run into a fair number of low wage workers and welfare moms living downtown who are open to suggestion from time to time when rent is due.

There are also some of the most breathtakingly stupid criminals in America landing in the area, but of course they generally don't last long in a town with more eyes in the sky than noses to pick, which requires every lodging establishment to provide a daily roster for cross referencing with national databases of watches, wants, and warrants.

W

[Wastrel]

Also heard that the Aladdin is turning into a "Planet Hollywood" resort? Say it ain't so!

Disgusting, but true. See for example my post on 04-05-05, #131 in 2005 General Reports, titled "defiling Wastrel's lamp."

The hotel is now under separate ownership, by Starwood Resorts (the Sheraton chain), so you can book a room and use the big marble soaking tubs built for two without fear of contributing to the craven celebrity sniffers who've taken over the casino.

I give the Planet people about two years, since they've already conclusively proven they can't manage a lemonade stand, having already gone bankrupt twice running a few medium sized restaurants in spite of oodles of capital from entertainment industry backers.

[USTraveller]

I just read an article on the web that mentioned that the San Remo hotel/casino was being turned in to HOOTERS hotel/casino! Is this true? and when is the grand opening?

I think the grand opening date came and went! I was looking forward to the changover also. I just hope their buffet doesn't have Hooter's food. If so, it will be worse than the Boardwalk's buffet.

More info can be found here.

-USTraveller

[BigGuy]

I just read an article on the web that mentioned that the San Remo hotel/casino was being turned in to HOOTERS hotel/casino! Is this true? and when is the grand opening?

I've not been to LV in almost a year, I'll have to book my room as soon as they open! That will be great for picking up the "bridge girls" as I like to call them. I wonder if I can get one of them to dress up as a "HOOTERS girl"!!(I'm sure I can for the right $$$$)

You guys have to admit, strickly from an eye candy stand point, there's no better restaurant than HOOTERS.

Also heard that the Aladdin is turning into a "Planet Hollywood" resort? Say it ain't so!

Good luck to all, BIGGUY
Mesa Yo!

[Desert Dude]

Can you let me know what the driving time would be to the courses in Boulder City from the strip?

How may courses are there in Boulder City?

So hard not to just post a link to Mapquest. I'd figure a half hour, 45 minutes if you're hungover. There's two courses there, forgot the names, locals tend to think of them as the 'old' course, and the 'new' course. The new course isn't as old as the other one. The new course is very very nice. The new course is very very expensive. The old course isn't as new as the other one. It's perfectly fine golf for under .50.

[Travel Guy]

Can you let me know what the driving time would be to the courses in Boulder City from the strip?

How may courses are there in Boulder City?

[Cienega32]

Ahhhh, nothing like firing off a few hundred rounds at a piece of paper before some nice soothing sex...

Tho' a Thompson would be cool if only for the historic merit. I would like to see one those 100 round cans empty out in a run.

[Wastrel]

...For those who have ID to get a hotel room in LV, they should have passed the drivig [sic] test, which made them the elites [sic] of California drivers...

I tried to be a good boy, but I can’t hold it any longer. After two weeks, the more you read that (Post #330 in General Reports) the more hilarious it becomes.

[Wastrel]

P·Z 's Tip o' the Day is that you head on down to The Gun Store Store on Tropicana Blvd [ http://www.thegunstorelasvegas.com/ ] ; rent your·self a full auto weapon...

Outstanding! I see that Tuesday is Ladies Day on the firing range. Babes and bullets. How very Vegas.

I also see it's conveniently near to Fox's Spy Outlet at 2055 E Tropicana Ave, a noteworthy retail outlet for surveillance and counter surveillance devices.

[PsyberZombie]

No , not *that* kind of Bang !!

P·Z 's Tip o' the Day is that you head on down to The Gun Store Store on Tropicana Blvd [ http://www.thegunstorelasvegas.com/ ] ; rent your·self a full auto weapon ; purchase a bunch of ammo pre·loaded in the appropriate clips ; then go out back to their firing range and turn some paper targets in·to confetti

They have a wall in·side with every kind of weapon mounted , from hand·guns to the Thompson sub·machine gun [ the famous 'Tommy Gun' with the circular magazine like they used in 'The Un·touchables' and count·less gangster movies ]

When Yours Truly was last in there , I selected the Hekler & Koch MP5·A3 , the weapon made famous by the Pulitzer Prize·winning photo of 'Elian Gonzales in the Closet' . The guy there offered to sell me one for seventy·five hundred dollars , but I passed

[ pictured here is the MP5·A4 , virtually the same weapon =
http://*******.com/cm22s ]

I also bought one of their verrrry Cool T·shirts

So check it out and have a Blast , Gentle·men !!

[Wastrel]

...Ever chase splittails at the Gordon Biersch right next door? I've been told it's a pretty good singles place. I've not explored it as a quick bj downtown can be had for the cost of like 3 beers there lol. OK, 4.

That's a pretty fun corner of Vegas right there, next to 'restaurant row'. Plus it's just a couple blocks from Ellis Island's buck drafts and 5 buck steaks.

I never have gotten around to checking out the microbrew singles place, but I agree that Ellis Island has some attractions. Something about the kind of tourist gals who come to Vegas to stay in a place (next door) that markets itself as "The biggest Super 8 Motel in the world!" and to party in a "casino" in which the major attraction is "buck a drink, all drinks, all the time."

[Desert Dude]

By far my number one preferred choice is on the west side of Paradise Road on the edge of the Hughes Center just a little north of Flamingo Road, a.k.a. the "Stripper Starbucks."
W

Thanks for the tips W, I've been there a couple times while using the attached Kinko's to print my Southwest boarding passes. There was one of the new Aston Martin's there last time I stopped. Ever chase splittails at the Gordon Biersch right next door? I've been told it's a pretty good singles place. I've not explored it as a quick bj downtown can be had for the cost of like 3 beers there lol. OK, 4.

That's a pretty fun corner of Vegas right there, next to 'restaurant row'. Plus it's just a couple blocks from Ellis Island's buck drafts and 5 buck steaks.

[Wastrel]

I know of three 24 hour Starbucks in town. Yes, I know, overpriced designer yuppie coffee and all, but for me a good quality humongous cuppa joe with a sugar kick is as essential as gas in the tank and a clear windshield when hunting around all the far flung SW tracks in the middle of the night, so pipe down with all the hisses and catcalls back there.

The Golden Nugget has one with an outdoor terrace for smoking and watching what strolls by on Fremont. It is overrun with blue haired little old ladies from Tulsa or someplace fascinated with the lightshow during the hours that thing is fired up, but after midnight they go to bed, and you can actually park legally quite easily across the street from the east side of the Nugget by about one in the AM most nights. I find that once the older downtown tourist crowd thins out it is occasionally a passably good spot for fishnet stocking inspections and stiletto heel sightings. About once out of every five or six times when refueling myself there between one and three I see a stray working girl or two heading home from a hard night of loitering.

The Aladdin has one inside the casino which requires a reenactment of the Bataan Death March to get through the maze of the Desert Passage mall from the parking garage, but you can entertain yourself on the pilgrimage toward the ghost of the lamp by checking out some of the ludicrous items in the display windows, such as the set of his and hers diamond encrusted handcuffs on sale for only $3,500+tax, for example. It is actually easier to reach on foot from the pedestrian walkway on Las Vegas Blvd, and there is a convenient ledge to sit on out front which is an excellent place to shop for late night CW specials strolling by without burning a bunch of your own shoe leather on the Strip.

By far my number one preferred choice is on the west side of Paradise Road on the edge of the Hughes Center just a little north of Flamingo Road, a.k.a. the "Stripper Starbucks." I would really like to be able to figure out the shift schedule of this one. Not the employees, but the customers. Sometimes the outdoor terrace is filled with strippers from some nearby joints, other times with Japanese girls, occasionally with Russian mob goombahs with or without their stable of East-European blonde assets, other times with the Metro gang enforcement unit, and sometimes with a group of Ethiopian ladies. It is almost always crowded on the smoker friendly terrace 'till nearly dawn, but I just can't figure out the schedule of the various groups. I really would love to seduce any one of those delicious looking Ethiopian ladies, if anyone has any tips for culturally specific pickup approaches that might help me break in with them. I find that the Metro guys can be worth chatting with as well, since I prefer not to get in their way when they target an area, and asking how and where things are going can help me decide to go where they and their gang-banger targets are not. Oh yes, since this is a company owned store, the corporate headquarters makes them shut down the cash registers for a while sometime between two and three every night while they remotely download the data from the day's transactions. Since they're not allowed to touch the cash register while this is going on, they just make your drink and give it to you gratis. Apparently HQ operates on the theory that this is the best window for downtime. Starbucks doesn't get Vegas.

W