We decided to stay at the Wynn and check it out. It was very nice and ranks up there with some of my other favorites, including the Ballagio, the Hard Rock, and Mandalay Bay. One cool thing about the room was the flatscreen HDTV in the bedroom… that was unique. There was another flatscreen regular TV in the bathroom, so I didn’t miss any of Roger Dodge and Blind Date at 1 AM while I was brushing my teeth.

The Wynn is supposed to have the only topless pool in Vegas. So Will and I immediately went there, and the pool staff promptly requested that we put our shirts back on and asked why we would ever thought to expose ourselves right after the buffet. We had no excuse and just curled up into a ball and cried while other girls laughed at us.

And here is a shot of Will STILL reading The World Is Flat. I gave it to him over three months ago and he is still not done. I saw some of his reading habits at the pool, as he slowly read about 2 pages while interrupting himself, lamenting about how he overate at the buffet.

This is an extremely impractical gift, but one I will be giving to all my environmentalist friends (which I can count on one hand).

Here are some cool TVs that we saw at CES. I think the last thing kids need is their own TV, but if you are gonna get them one, then these are pretty sweet!

So we decided to go back the Lux at the Venetian for lunch since we spent most of the morning at the nearby Sands Convention center because we really dug this appetizer. Check it out:

Here is the description of the appetizer - who could avoid ordering it?

Double Stuffed Potato Spring Rolls
Creamy Mashed Potatoes with a Touch of Green Onion, Rolled in Crispy Asian Wrappers Topped with Melted Cheddar, Applewood Smoked Bacon and Green Onion. Served with Sour Cream.

They sounded good - so we ordered THREE OF THEM.

I found a cool plugin for Wordpress - let’s see how it works.

So there is a picture that I took at the Venetian outside of the new Blue Man Group ticket office. I am of the opinion that the Blue Man Group is one of the most overrated acts in history. I am reminded of how inane it is by looking at this stupid promotional poster.

Of course the Ritz Carlton would not let a regular taxi muss their porte cochere, so they had to call me a special sedan. Anyway, I had this cool Muslim driver and we ended up talking politics the whole time. I immediately figured out he was one of the good Muslims and not one of the crazy ones. This is good, since I did not want to get to the airport early to get a bagel, and I did not want to be blown up.

He was very upset with all the crazy Muslims, giving him a bad name. In fact, he went on to say a lot of the Koran was kind of silly, and most Muslims don’t take everything in there too seriously.

We went on to talk about religions and what a sweet marketing bullet point is the “67 virgins upon death” thing. That was a great idea by the Muslim Marketing Department. The Christians and the Jews have much more boring marketing bullet points by comparison.

I saw this mannequin in the Ceasar’s Palace mall. I don’t remember the name of the store, but I remember thinking that this was kinda unusual:

We went to go see the newest show here in Vegas called “Le Reve”, which is French for “The Dream”. The French are already weird enough when they are awake, so we can only imagine what they are like when they dream.

This is another production of Cirque de Soleil, of which I have seen almost all iterations by now. I normally come away very impressed, which is rare since I am hard to impress. This version was based entirely in the water, which sat in a ring in the middle of the auditorium. There were some very nice routines, but much of it felt like a repeat of other Cirque de Soleils, but just in the water. One thing is for sure - there is no shortage of men with perfect bodies and amazing metabolisms in Vegas. I curse them all.

The new Wynn hotel here in Vegas is pretty cool. It doesn’t have a “theme” like the other casinos, which will probably result in a nice longevity for it. It was very colorful inside, and somewhat quirky, so maybe you could say it had a bit of a Cirque de Soliel theme. It probably had one of the nicest pools in Vegas and some of the more interesting restaurants and clubs.

Below is a shot of this modern art waterfall wall that is in the front of the casino. It is very strange, but kind of cool. I normally really don’t like modern art, and I resent when some black-rimmed glasses wearing moron tries to explain how a splotch of paint on a Dr. Pepper can represents man’s inhumanity to man. But this modern art was nice, even though this is a horrible picture because the sun was in a bad spot. At night, as they shine lasers on the waterfall.

Below is a menu from one of the nicer restaurants here called Alex. You can see there is a different wine served with each course.

I stopped and had a drink at this place. You can see how the cognac at the bottom, the Chateau de Montifaud, costs $904. If you look on the bottom line, if you order that with ice, then the total cost is $906.50.

There is another section of the hotel that has one of the premier Ferrari collections in the world.

Below is a picture of the 18th green at the golf course behind the Wynn. This is the re-done Desert Inn course. The course has not opened yet, as they are still letting the grass grow. It reminds me of some of Gustaf’s prospects back in Sweden.

We went out to get some Kobe steaks tonight over at a place called Craft Steak in the MGM. They were kind of pricey - about $150 per person - but they were drunken-massaged-Japanese-cow-mmmm-mmmm good.

I saw this slot machine here in the New York New York. Don’t you think something looks kinda funny with Dick Clark’s head?

Check out this lady’s dog. I saw another lady pushing around a double-stroller that was holding four miniature white poodles.

Here is a giant piano that you can dance on inside FAO Schwartz. There were a couple of employees that jumped up there too and did a really slick routiine. I don’t know if they were straight.

This is a shot of the new shopping area at Ceasar’s Palace. The existing shopping area was already the best in Vegas, but this new area was even better. Check out those cool curvy escalators.

They also had an awesome photography store and with some amazing pictures. Here is one of my favorites:

Monty and I decided to check out the Star Trek Experience today at the Hilton hotel. I was expecting something totally lame, but it was actually cool. Well, cool in a Star Trek kinda way.

In the beginning, we were all herded into a room and there were lachrymose guys working there and beginning the tour. They were in these lame Starfleet uniforms and one guy said to the other, in a sad distant voice, “Commander Flipfellow, is the away team ready to go?” On the other side of the room, behind all of us, the other guy answered in an equally distant and practiced way, “Yes, Commander. My phaser is set on ‘fun’.”

The rest of the tour was actually sort of cool. It was pretty much an exact replica of the bridge from the Next Generation, and I could almost get into it, if there wasn’t a 300 pound woman in front of me that was wearing a T-shirt that said, “Branson, Missouri - It’s Not Just for Chicken-Fried Steak.”