Shane Life

Vegas baby. Vegas.

So we surprised my buddy Jason for his 30th birthday with a trip to Vegas. 10 of us piled into two rooms for the weekend at Harrahs. He was unbelievably surprised…it was so much fun.

Alli’s post pretty much sums it up. Great trip. Awesome surprise. Well done, Brooke.

I’ve experienced such amazingly bad luck in a trip to a casino. I played poker with Jason one night and I’ll tell you what…I didn’t get but maybe 2 hands that I could play. When I finally went all-in, I had K-J, which was by far my best hand of the night. Guy called me with A-J and his A won. That’s weak.

I would win some money at the nickel slots (I think I won about 50 bucks…not bad for nickels!), but I got worked over playing Let it Ride.

One of the highlights to the trip (besides the trip itself) was getting to go see The Beatles’ themed Cirque de Soleil show at the Mirage, LOVE.

It was so unique and brilliant and it featured such incredible music and told a great story. Totally worth the money to go. We all really enjoyed seeing it. My dad will absolutely love it when he finally gets to see it.

Other funny highlights of the trip:

• Stalking Coach K in the high-limit slots at Harrah’s
• Watching Stowell go on perhaps the best blackjack run I’ve ever seen
• Brooke getting hooked on high-limit slots
• Brooke being “too tired to eat” on Sunday morning
• Taking naps at the pool on the first day because our room wasn’t ready (in our normal clothes)
• My 7-team parlay that would have paid me $1000 if I wouldn’t have missed 4 of the games (stupid KU, Penn State, Saints and Chiefs!)
• The random girls from Chicago that our girls met in the bathroom
• Seeing Kevin Richardson from the Backstreet Boys at Caesars
• Seeing Old Downtown Vegas for the first time (no, seriously, we can walk there…really, Jason?)
• Seeing why no one goes to Old Downtown (what a hole!)
• The free ceiling show in Old Downtown
• “Who is that guy? Is he famous?”
  “He must be, he’s driving a Bentley!”
• “Jason, thanks for last night…signed, Vegas Showgirl at Harrah’s” funniest picture
• High fives all around to the casino
• Almost getting kicked out of Chipotle thanks to Brooke
• Watching the Bellagio fountains…seriously never gets old…so incredible
• Not winning a single sports bet that I made (out of 4)
• …so many more

Great trip all around. Fun stuff. When’s the next one?

Las Vegas is truly a spectacle.

The last time I was in Vegas was about 4 years ago with Alli, Rich, Sarah, and the Beckmans. It was a great time, the first time I’d spent multiple days in Vegas as an adult. I was anxious to come back because a lot has changed in 4 years. In addition, I had the excellent fortune of being a part of a conference where I got to stay at the gorgeous Mandalay Bay Resort, one of the newer (and definitely one of the nicer) resorts on the Strip.

Shortly after we got settled, we hooked up with the rest of our group and went to a fantastic dinner at the Red White and Blue Bistro in the hotel. I had this seafood dish that was absolutely incredible. It was albacore tuna, salmon, shrimp and scallops in a parchment bag with red peppers and seasoning cooked extremely well.

After a relatively painless flight, we checked into the hotel and got settled in. It was my first conference that I’ve been to in a while that I roomed with someone that wasn’t Kevin, so I was certainly wondering how it was going to go. The first night, we didn’t do much. There was an opening keynote speaker named Michael Moschen, who was, in a word - CRAZY. Moschen is a juggler and performance artist who has helped bring the explosion of circus performances to Las Vegas (read: Cirque de Soliel). Speaking of that, I don’t know if there isn’t a major hotel in Las Vegas that DOES NOT have a Cirque show. There are a bunch of them now…back when we came 4 years ago, the only one around was O at the Bellagio. The one that I really want to see is Love at the Mirage…it’s entirely choreographed to Beatles tunes…totally sweet.

What made Moschen’s presentation so crazy was that he didn’t really say anything…he just talked about his “studies” of circles and spheres and then would show us cool juggling “techniques” he had developed, but really there wasn’t a lot about risk, which was supposed to be the premise of his talk. He ran a half-hour over his allotted time, and by the time he finished, the room (which had been almost to its 4,500 capacity at the start) was at least half-empty. People clapped, but I think that they may have actually been slapping the people around them to wake up.

The Opening reception was just OK. Not much to it when your opening reception is just in a big convention center adjacent to the Exhibitor Hall. Afterward, we walked up the Strip a bit before turning in for a big first official day.