The T3sk3y Defenestrator

Now that I’ve had a chance to get settled back in at home and rested – I realized that I never gave a final update to my Vegas trip.

After my last update, I wandered down the strip to the Sahara trying to find a craps game that had better than the 2x odds available at the Riviera. The Sahara did not disappoint! 5x odds, $5 minimum. In about 45 minutes I was able to liberate an easy $75 from the table (again after going down sharply early in the game) and I walked away with my Corona in hand.

Before walking home, I had to hop on Speed – the Ride at the Sahara. Besides being a pinball geek, I’m a HUGE roller coaster geek. Speed has not one but two LIMs (that’s Linear Induction Motor – or a big-ass magnetic slingshot in non-techspeak) that take you from 0-40 in 30 feet, then zip you from 40 to 80 in another 30 feet. I swear that I can feel wind flapping around my eyeballs.

I walked from the Sahara to the Wynn – holy moly. Vegas has abandoned the city theme and gone back to the “big and rich” theme of 30 years ago. From there, I wandered to the Frontier in search of good craps games.

Ah, the Frontier. Old skool divey Vegas at it’s best. $5 min, 10x odds at the craps table. Hard to lose, if you have the guts to play those odds. I brought with the booth staff from the show and taught them how to play craps – and Emily (the bosses daughter) went on a 45 minute roll. She rolled 4 – 10 – 4 – 10 – 4 – 10 back to back. Why is that great? I was playing the pass line plus multiple come bets. Every time she hit one of those 4′s or 10′s I was putting almost $50 into my rack. Again, I started down $120, ended up walking away from the table $275 ahead.

The end of the night consisted of a buffet at the Frontier and one more shot at the tables. I pulled another $20 away, but it was a grind – up and down all over the map.

All in all, a -phenominal- trip – but it’s the worst thing that could have happened. I won with impunity. That’s a good recipe for future disaster. That’s the risk you take, I guess..

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Hello from Las Vegas! I flew in last night to help a client with their booth at Infocomm ’05. Infocomm is a basically a smaller version of CES tightly focused at the presentation people – pro audio, high end home installs, large screen presentations, stage equipment, etc. I’m running around like an autistic kid at Chucky Cheese – EVERYTHING is cool.

Some of the cool things so far? A 102″ plasma screen at Samsung. Holy cow – 8′ of glass is BIG.

There’s some booth near us with multiple 15″ subwoofers and a wall of amps. Every 15 minutes, they cause a small earthquake in the area that causes my teeth to rattle. Cool.

Here’s the booth I’m working in for Cetacea Sound:

Beyond the trade show – it’s been a good trip so far in spite of being an hour late due to the plane. I had my first shot at the craps tables last night and made about $40 in a pretty short time. Yeah, that doesn’t sound like much – but I went down quickly very early and had to battle back. The streakiness of craps never ceases to amaze me! I’m giving my feet a short rest before hitting it again tonight.

I also got in a little pinball playing – I discovered there are a dozen machines within a Las Vegas block of me. In my hotel (the Riviera), there’s a “Theater of Magic”, a “Ripley’s Believe it or Not”, “High Speed 2″ and “Simpson’s Pinball Party”. Unfortunately, all are shamefully neglected. I’m guessing they aren’t the top priority of things to put quarters into in Vegas.

More updates as the trip progresses…

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It’s been a few weeks since I’ve had a DDR (that’s Dance Dance Revolution to those not in the know) tidbit. Here’s one off of hackaday.com:

It’s Dance Dance Immolation, coming to San Francisco soon! Dance Dance Immolation

edit – That looks damn near as hot as it is here in MN today – thank goodness I’m off to Sin City where the desert heat in the summer is going to be that much more pleasant. BTW: I think it’s funny that I’ve got money to bet on the “Don’t Pass” line for the Pack winning the Super Bowl. Hahaha. Silly Pack.

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I heard over the weekend that the ‘Crazy Frog’ ringtone for cell phones has now brought in $18,000,000. Holy crap, I’m in the wrong business.

For those confused.. Crazy Frog

Be sure to crank your speakers..

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It’s only 18 more days until my favorite day of the entire year – Summer Solstice! No, I’m not going tree-hugger. It to me signifies that we’re over the hump and we’re halfway to ski season. I’m really starting to notice it the last couple of days – it got hot and humid literally overnight.

It never needs to be above 75.

Only 6 months – and 18 days – left until skiing! Cross your fingers and hope for lots of snow – last year was bad.

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The second weekend of summer is fast approaching – here’s a quick preview of what’s happening around the T3sk3y compound..

I’m going to try to get in a little pinball playing at S&S Billiards on my way home tonight with Sheardo. Later, I’m participating in an at-home study (for work) on media users and their habits. Basically, they are going to quiz me about my status as a gadget nerd. It’s a $100 Best Buy gift certificate for my troubles – more fuel for my habit.

Saturday is going to be a busy one – I’m helping to build a pergola (yeah, it’s a real word – I thought Kermit made it up) at Kermit’s place during the day – then it’s Tad’s bachelor party. We’re doing a light rail pub crawl from the Mall of America to downtown.

On Sunday, we shall rest.

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On Sunday, I went to check out the most-hyped movie of the year (so far) – Star Wars, Ep. III – Revenge of the Sith. I’ll save the reviews for the sites that specialize in it – but I do have a few thoughts. Warning – there’s probably a spoiler or two to follow…

Here’s my main thought about the movie:

George Lucas is the master at imagining and designing the coolest mechanical “space things” -ever-. He’s also completely clueless when it comes to humans.

Really really cool stuff:

• General Grievous and the four-armed lightsaber battle. Wow.
• The ‘water snowmobiles’ during the Wookie battle
• General Grievous’s one-wheel-with-legs speeder
• The double ended shocking staffs carried by General Grievous’ guards
• The big space fight scene at the beginning was gorgeous

On the other hand.. stuff that just hurt to watch or made me go, ‘huh?’

• How did they breathe or not get sucked into space after they shattered the window in space?
• When Natalie Portman seemed just fine naming her babies, than suddenly went *uuurk* and died
• The whole Wookie thing seemed really cheesy
• Anakin seemed to switch to the dark side without much thought – “What have I done?” “Okay, I’m evil now”
• I got a snicker about how many loose ends they tied up at the end in 30 seconds – by wiping C3PO’s memory and by saying “Oh, by the way Obi-wan – you can learn to talk to the dead”
• How is it that Lucas gets such bad performances out of really good actors such as Samuel L. Jackson and Natalie Portman?
• And – the biggest stinker – (drum roll, please..) – the Chewbacca style bellow expression of pain by Vader after the Emporer says he killed his wife. Ugh.

All in all, it’s the best of the first three – and I *did* like it. There are apparently just things you have to suffer through in each movie.

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Just wanted to drop a few quick raves on you from the past week..

• System of a Down‘s new album – Mezmerize : This album hit me over the head like a sex doll full of lead shot. Really.
• Conga Latin Bistro – 501 E. Hennepin, Mpls. : Great latin lunch buffet – too bad only about 6 people eat there each lunch hour.
• Sonicare : I picked up a spare at a garage sale for $3 – it’s a new all-star in the pinball rehab business! Can you say – gunk-b-gone?
• The harder side of Sears : Craftsman = The Last Bastion of Manhood
• The episode of “World Poker Tour” I watched last night – when A/10 beat a A/A by drawing into a straight on the turn & river
• Chaska.net for unexplainedly giving me 3.5 Mbit service – when it’s supposed to be 1.2Mbit

I suppose a few jeers would be in order, too…

• MnDOT – They *knew* the new toll lane would be a Charlie Foxtrot. MnDOT saw toll lane trouble coming – I’ve been averaging an HOUR since that monstrosity opened.
• Weezer – So, why would anybody actually be IN to Weezer? Thanks, MTV.
• Chaska.net – again. Nothing like giving me 5kbit when I should get 1.2Mbit.

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