While Las Vegas Sleeps…

There’s one thing that is the suck about being a web worker in Las Vegas: technological enhancement proximity (or a lack thereof, rather.)

I have a very large project that I have been working on and working towards achieving for some months now and to that end I’ve had some personal remediation that I’ve had to do in la manière du monde with regards to the world wide web technologies such as xhtml, css, and current web standards, php, mysql, content management systems, templating systems, and server side scripting languages. In another life I was an op on #html on EFNet IRC, but that was before browsers caught up with the way things should be (and the way things are now finally becoming,) and beside the fact that I’ve probably forgotten more than most people will ever know about web technologies, well, thangs, they are a-changing, and my ventures require me to be squarely on top of them. Sooooo… You’ve got to bootstrap yourself with what you have and add as much to it as you can in the shortest time possible. I gots to get my learn on.

That’s the problem. The best way to go about that is to find 3-5 day boot-camp style class and just immerse yourself in it. Those just don’t exist in Las Vegas, at least not for anything I need them for. This explains why there have been several weeks in the past couple of months where there have been days without a post, sadly. Three different times now, I’ve had to leave the blessed warmth and soothing chaos of our fair city for the July damp coldness of San Francisco to get the knowledge that I seek, alas. At least the sourdough bread is top shelf!

The good news is that I have finished and these trips, minus a vacation in August, are over! Now I’m going to be able to focus on “While Las Vegas Sleeps…” and we can all rest much easier knowing that the debauched fun and excitement can continue in earnest…

Tags: css, debauchery, mysql, php, San Francisco, summer, web worker, xhtml

I was sitting here in my living room, replying to some emails and catching up on a few things online when I heard it: the sweet, violent, glorious sound of thunder!

I’ve written before about how the one thing I miss about living where I grew up in Texas is the weather. There is something so amazing and so emotionally invigorating about thunderstorms to me. Serious rains storms make me feel so relaxed and so at peace… You just don’t get a lot of them here in the desert. When it does rain, though, it makes it all the more a treat for me.

Just a few minutes back I heard thunder. I went to the front door to look outside and apparently this place is insulated very, very well because it was raining seriously hard! Elizabeth is coming to pick me up and I’m going to ride around in it. I can’t wait!

Holy crap.. the power just went out! That’s pretty unusual for Las Vegas weather. I love it!

It’s like this from around this time of year through around the middle to the end of August. Prevailing wind patterns change bring occasional moisture from from the east to the west, as opposed to the normal air flow in the opposite direction. With the hot, high pressure air here the slightly lower pressure moist air can make for some awesome storms. And flooding. I saw a wall of dust and wind and rain move across the valley floor about four years ago that looked so crazy. I just stayed outside until it hit me. It was so odd - this wall looking section of air with all this dust and debris and rain in it just hits me at once and the breeze turned into wind. Definitely some interesting weather in the desert when it happens…

Tags: Las Vegas outdoors, news, rain, Southern Nevada, summer, thunderstorm

It’s been a couple of years now since I heard the early rumors of a very, very tall building project for Las Vegas being proposed by an Australian billionaire developer. It was being talked about around the same time that Ivana Trump announced her super-tall building on the property at the corner of Las Vegas Boulevard and Sahara. In fact, it was at a time when it seemed like all you heard on the news was the latest and greatest imaginings of super-wealthy developers for Las Vegas and the impending “Manhattanization” of our fair city. They even have a web domain and “magazine” devoted to it, though I’ve never seen it anywhere.. Well, Ivana’s project fell apart (after getting FAA approval for a very tall tower) but Donald’s is almost finished, though in total, I’d venture a guess of around 75% of the high-rise (and mid-rise and otherwise-rise) projects talked about have been shelved, at least for now.

According to a KLAS-TV story, there’s a project currently in the works by an Australian billionaire, with the help of a Texas developer and a New York investment firm. The story says that their intentions are to put together a project with a tower 1,888 feet tall (around 700 feet taller than the Stratosphere) that would have 5000 rooms and the requisite gaming, retail, restaurant space, et cetera, of course. It’s height would make it the tallest building in the United States, regardless of the fact that historically it’s been hotel-casino girth, not length, that have made for the most profitable ventures. Take the MGM Grand, Mandalay Bay or the new Red Rock Hotel and Casino for examples… I’m telling ya, it’s all about the girth, baby. The Stratosphere has never been a stellar bread-winner. You can see it from all over the valley, though. Like a big protruding bulge calling attention to itself…

My question, out of curiosity, not cynicism, is why? As far as real estate goes, the general consensus is that things aren’t looking too great for Las Vegas for the next 30 months or so, possibly longer, and there is already so much hotel and gaming space in the works to be brought online in the next two years - probably several years before this project could hope to be finished (if it ever actually gets off the ground, no pun intended.)

I really believe in Vegas. I love this city. I think the future is very bright, indeed, but in business timing is everything. I’m not in the business of hotel-casino market analysis, but I have a pretty good sense for things in general, and I’m just trying to figure out how this thing could be profitable, particularly in light of all the big-but-not-this-monumental project cancellations. Seems to me that there might be a lesson in there somewhere… And I didn’t even mention anything about the aesthetics of our amazing skyline having a disproportional growth spurt on one end of it… I’ll digress.

Hey, what the hell. If you’ve got the money, honey, build that sucker! I have a sneaking suspicion the FAA is going to take a dump all over this one, though… It would make jumbo jets cruising across the north part of the Las Vegas Strip look like a football trying to make it through the uprights - the Stratosphere and “Crown Las Vegas” - the name they are giving this thing.

Tags: aesthetics, casino, Donald Trump, engineering, football, gambling, gaming, girth, Mandalay Bay Hotel, Manhattanization, MGM Grand Hotel, news, Red Rock Hotel, skyscrapers, Stratosphere Hotel, Trump Las Vegas

Being a hardcore, dyed-in-the-wool poker player at heart myself, of the stories I’ve heard come out of the World Series of Poker this year, there is only one that speaks of pure dedication to such a noble cause as the game of life we know as “poker” and could earn my vote for Poker Player of the Year… Paul Clark’s story.

Here is a guy - a professional player - who takes the game so seriously that while he’s in competition for the title of Razz World Champion - final table, no less - has suffered multiple mini-strokes and refuses to leave the game to seek medical treatment. I’ve only heard similar tales dating back to the old school road gambler days… like way back there to the times of Johnny Moss and his rough youth coming up in gambling. That’s how Paul Clark’s World Series story resonates with me.

Absolutely amazing, this guy! Crazy? Maybe. You say tomato, I say sugo bianco sauce. I’m just saying that I can see where he is coming from. I’m not saying ethically that it’s good or bad or indifferent. That sort of determination every man (or woman) would have to make for themselves. I’m simply saying that I understand. It has to be pointed out again, though, that he was in contention for a world championship, and on the home stretch, at that. How many athletes out there - even in high school football, for example, much less the Superbowl - have chosen to play injured? Actually, how many have been psychologically compelled by their coaches and peers to play with an injury “for the good of the team?” Well, this ain’t high school football, kids, and the only team you can let down has one player and it’s someone you have to live with day in and day out… hearing him say “dammit why didn’t you just….?”

So yeah, I can understand Paul Clark. And he gets my vote: Paul Clark, Poker Player of the Year.

Tags: blog, casino, gambling, gaming, news, poker, Rio Hotel, Stories, story, World Series of Poker