The Hangover

For the longest time I thought that the movie was a bit (a lot) farfetched because as much fun and tomfoolery a few friends may be able to have in the crazy City of Sin... it's probably not really doable to squeeze all those activities into one day/night.  Annie came into town and we totally disproved that theory.

I think the best way to approach this explanation is by creating a chronological itinerary of the 1.75 days we spent together...

MONDAY, 4/15/2013
4:45pm - I picked her up from the McCarran Airport and headed straight to The Mirage Hotel & Casino.  We went to a lovely wine tasting lounge / restaurant called Onda Ristorante and redeemed our Travelzoo deal for a white wine flight and appetizer each.  We ended up getting completely free full glass of wine to go with our flight because the server was just pretty awesome.  We had Fried Calamari and a Caprese Salad.  *yum*

7:00pm or 8:00ish - Once we were finished, we decided to just ramble around and see what fun we could find.  We took a tram from the Mirage to Treasure Island.  We got one of those Vegas icon yard long icy drinks - but honestly, it tasted so crappy we threw it away after a short while.  We then somehow found ourselves in the Wynn.  We tried to get a picture taken inside the beautiful lit up forest - but these very awkward foreign tourists had the hardest time operating my phone's camera.  Like, the lady kept tapping the screen SUPER HARD to take the picture, so no matter what she did the picture was blurry because she literally just tapped so hard the phone would flop forward and back up while it took the picture.  Anyway, we then found ourselves inside of a Chanel store and I literally had to (gently) smack a wallet out of her hands.  We also went to Dior and almost, almost, almost bought matching sunglasses.  Holy cow, never enter designer shops tipsy.

9:30pm - Afterwards, of course we had to visit my favorite dessert spot ever - Jean Philippe at the Aria.  I think she had the Tiramisu and I had this big raspberry / rose macaron that my friend Jackie introduced to me from her trip in France... I believe it is called an Ispahan.  It's pretty much like a little bit of heaven inside your mouth.  *drool* We stayed and chatted for a while until finally our eyelids were closing by themselves and we knew we had a very long day tomorrow so we decided to call it a night.


TUESDAY, 4/16/2013

7:00am - We woke up and I made breakfast sandwiches for breakfast at my apartment.  Then we got ready to head out for our spa morning.

9:00am - We arrived at The Palms to get Swedish massages at Drift Spa with, once again, Travelzoo vouchers.  We each enjoyed a 50 minute massage and then went to their women's spa area and heated up in the sauna.  Then we showered and got all dried up and ready to move on with our day in a nice, relaxed state.

12:00 noon - What is Vegas without a buffet?  The Wicked Spoon  at The Cosmopolitan is easily my favorite buffet - not only is the variety phenomenal but really everything tastes amazing.  Haha, of course the picture is of desserts, but I promise the food is incredible even without photographic proof.  Once we were extremely stuffed we headed out on the road for the drive up to my future home (yes, I drag everyone who visits me to the construction site because I think it's so super special to watch my home get built - sorry visitors!)

2:00pm-ish - I showed her the slab of foundation or maybe at that time it was still just dirt with some trenches.  We also walked through some of the model homes next to the sales office.  The sales agent actually let us into one of the homes in my floorplan that was in the middle of being finished - so she saw an almost finished home exactly like what I'll be living in some months from now.

3:30pm - We made a quick coffee run and then headed over to Pacific Archery to learn how to shoot like Katniss.  The instructor was a little bit of a Chatty Cathy and totally 'misdiagnosed' Annie of her right-left-eyedness... as in he told her that her dominant eye was Right? but it was really Left (switch them if that's wrong) and it was totally the opposite of what it should be for a left-handed person.  So, she was shooting with the wrong eye and in the wrong hand - she kept hitting the inside of her arm with the bowstring on the reverb and it totally messed her arm all up!!  She looked like a crazy heroin junkie by the end of our lesson.  I walked away without a scratch and felt confident if I were in a post-apocalyptic death match, I could totally hit some people / zombies in the head.

5:30pm - We get back to my apartment and started to get dressed & made up for our big night out!  Some primping and fussing over our outfits and then we drove off to the Excalibur.

7:30pm - Hundreds of miles away from San Diego and where do we end up for a quick bite?  Buca de Beppo... lol.  Of course, we didn't have enough time, or appetite, to get our usual Frutti De Mar - so we settled for a Spinach Dip & Garlic Bread along with our first 2 cocktails of the evening.  While we waited for our refreshments, I stopped by will call to pick up our tickets...

9:00pm - We are seated and ready to go at... Thunder From Down Under!!  LOL, yes we totally went and it was totally awesome!  The show is really fun - I mean, honestly, they're total hotties but it was really entertaining even if they didn't seductively undress continuously.  There was this totally inappropriate grandma in the audience who was pulled up onto the stage and she grabbed the dancer's buttcheeks, caressed them, and then planted a kiss on one!!  What the heck?!!  The dancer was like really shocked - and so were all of us!  I guess... age makes women bolder?  Of course, the entertainment value was highly increased by the fact that we had another cocktail and a total of 6 jello shots between the two of us.

10:30pm - The show ended and Annie bravely approached the booth that Gene Simmons from KISS was sitting at with his lovely wife and their posse.  I don't know why they were there... but people were going bananas!  There was a crowd around their table to try and get autographs.  Turns out Annie is a gigantic fan of their reality show: Gene Simmons Family Jewels and the real star of the show is Gene's wife, Shannon.  Here is proof of their clandestine meeting - and she got Gene Simmons to autograph her Thunder from Down Under ticket.  *hurray*

11:00pm - We were a little tipsy, a little tired... and decided to go to the bar and get 2 waters and see what we wanted to do from there.  Here is the tipping point.  The bartender convinced us to take another jello shot - and we were like... what?! go home?! we're in Vegas, let's party!  First thought to pop in my head, let's take the tram to Mandalay Bay - I love it there!  (Mandy Bay & I are a bad romance... we have history *sigh*)  Of course, the tram is closed by that time so we geniuses decided to walk there, duh!  We step outside and started to walk... it seemed like the farther we walked, the farther it seemed to be.

11:30pm - 11:45ish - We cut through the Luxor.  On our way to the escalators to take the bridge, some guys were throwing things to each other up to the ledge where the rooms are.  I made a comment and then one of the guys tried to get cute and booty-bumped me when I walked past him - of course, I run gracelessly into a trashcan and get a little peeved.  On our way up... I said very loudly, for some reason, "Annie, he's WHITE!"  They all turn around to look at us - embarrassing.  Somehow, whenever I'm drunk, I sound very racist.  By the time we get to the Eyecandy Sound Lounge, we are in possession of matching whale socks.  Yeah, we just randomly went into a socks shop and got some whale socks.  Awesome.  We've also opened an oyster at one of those carts and got twin pearls!  GOOD THING DIOR WAS CLOSED... we probably would've bought those pricey sunglasses, no second thoughts.

12:30am - After one drink, we decided Eyecandy was totally whack because it was like 70's, 80's, 90's night and the music was not good and the people dancing were strange.  There was also a weird thing going on with this man sitting next to us - he seemed to be picking up this overly flirtatious woman who approached him.  Time to bounce!  I had the brilliant idea of going to my faaaavorite drunken stomping ground - the I-Bar at the Rio!

1:00am - We show up at the I-Bar and have another delicious drink but by this time we decided drinking was not enough... we must dance!  So, we got passes to the Voodoo Lounge and headed upstairs.  However, when we got there the doors were closed and no one was home.  *awwwww*

1:45am - We met this weird German dude in front of the closed club and he followed us back to the bar and made small talk.  Turns out it was just past the last call and we couldn't get anymore drinks... so, of course weird German dude invited us up to his room to drink red wine.  He was very specific.  We politely declined his invitation and he left.  Creeper.

2:00am - Were we ready to stop?  Of course not!!  This is Vegas - I used the power of google and we arrived at The Mirage (full 360 from our first stop straight out of the airport!) to party at 1-OAK... which I have since learned stands for 1 Of A Kind.  We encountered this distressed blond girl in the restroom who fed us this weird story about meeting a guy on the internet and he is waiting for her outside the restroom and we needed to pretend to be her friends and ask her to go inside the club so she didn't have to go up to his room with him.  We were like.... uhhhh.... ok.  Then she kept offering her drink to us.  We were like no but she was pushy about it.  My Dateline NBC with Chris Hansen alarms started ringing in my head.  I pretended to take sips and started to get super wary.  We still did that awkward pretend-to-be-her-friend skit... and then as we started walking away - he handed her a fistful of cash!  OMG... we were marked for human trafficking!  We all went inside the club and I told Annie to RUN!!  We ran in the opposite direction of the way she was heading and got to the bar.

image from urbanspoon - not us!

3:15am - We had danced to our little hearts' content and discovered we were SUPER HUNGRY.  We struck out to the lobby and followed the signs to Carnegie Delicatessan for some late, late night grub.  The club sandwich we got was gigantic but it wasn't very good... and that's terrible considering our condition after an entire night of drunken debauchery.  How can anything NOT taste amazing?  I remember not being impressed by the Carnegie a few years back when I ate their for dinner too... so, boo - never going back there again.

4:30am - We are back at home... ready to go to bed after an exhausting 22 hour day.  If it was a workday - I would've been leaving my house for work at that time... and that was the last conscious thought I had as my head hit the pillow.  *Zzzzzzz*

WEDNESDAY, 4/17/2013
9:30am - We woke up just a few short hours later and ate a very light breakfast... we weren't in the best of shape.  LOL, but we toughed it out and she got all packed up and we threw her luggage in the car.

11:00am - Annie came to Zappos with me and participated in a 60-minute tour even in our shabby state.  She was an excellent sport and was only sightly annoyed when this one girl kept asking very irrelevant questions about other businesses, like over and over and over again.  *grrrrr*

1:30pm - All good things must come to an end... and I dropped her off at the airport and had to say a sad goodbye.

This visit was so insanely epic!  Even though it took like a whole week for me to recover and reset my circadian rhythm / electrolytes... it was well worth it!

I had such a blast... miss you so much all the time!!! <3

Friendly Visit

Last week, my wonderful friend Dawn and her hubby Bart was out and about visiting family in Arizona and made a very sharp turn to visit Las Vegas and me... yay!  I joined up with them at the Las Vegas Hotel (used the be the Hilton) and then I took them to Downtown Las Vegas to check out my future stomping ground.  I am slightly familiar with the area from the scavenger hunt that I did as part of my New Hire Training.

We stopped by The Beat coffeehouse and got some beverages before heading upstairs to the Emergency Arts studio.  The vibe is really down to earth and relaxed, just a place where artists gather to show off their work and the coffeehouse routinely hosts local musical talent on various nights of the week.  It's pretty awesome to see this place just because it's kind of out of place adjacent to the extremely flashy, showy Fremont Street attractions.

Next, we savored a very delicious dinner at Le Thai - the Zappos endorsed (unofficially) Thai restaurant of Las Vegas.  Our CEO loves, loves, loves this place and has been known to eat there more than once a day at times.  The dishes are aromatic and pungent and the prices are reasonable for a good amount of food.  Tell me that isn't like the best combination ever?  I have a feeling that once we move our headquarters to Downtown, I am going to frequent this "hole-in-the-wall" gem more than I really should.  Anyone coming out... expect to eat here once just to see for yourself!  =)

We wrapped up at the restaurant and then they graciously agreed to go on a drive to see my as-yet-to-be-built new home.  It was really awesome that they were interested in seeing my future home because it was literally just a dirt lot.  I think the day I brought them, the construction team had just broken ground that day.  I don't think there had even been any trenching yet... soooooo.... just a bunch of dirt surrounded by some retaining walls.  They expected to see some of those stony peaks I mentioned in one of my last blog posts but, unfortunately, the route I took did not bring us past that way - maybe next time!  *hint hint, please come again*

I had to drop them off back at the hotel to go home and sleep because I had to go to work at 5am the next morning.  While I was at work, they went hiking around Red Rock Canyon... it's a beautiful place with some nice trails and overlooks.  We had radio silence for a little bit because there is no Wi-Fi, or really any sort of reception, out there in fabulous nature... but luckily we were able to coordinate a rendezvous at The Yard House inside the Red Rock Casino Resort.  Will and I met up with Dawn and Bart and even though the food was only moderately good... it was super wonderful to catch up with some awesome familiar faces!

While it has been so great to meet new people and make new friends out here in Las Vegas, I certainly miss my friends back in California!!  Not just in San Diego... but the ENTIRE state of California... hehehe.  Now that Will and I are getting nicely settled, hopefully we can finally start visiting our good friends soon.  I miss all of you...!

Thank you for coming out and visiting, Dawn & Bart!  Your bright cheerful faces made me so happy!  I hope to see you again before before TusCon in November!

Feeling like a hermit crab...

As some of you may know, Will and I are in the process of purchasing a new home over here in Las Vegas.  The loan approval process is always extremely tedious and even the slightest delay or lack of information can send the entire thing into a bottomless pit of underwriters.

This is what I wrote to them...

I called your customer service phone center to request a Pay Off Letter for my home loan process. It is a very common letter and well known by virtually every single financial institution - except CitiBank, apparently. After requesting twice and having the customer service representative misunderstand my intentions, she finally put me on hold to ask someone else what to do. She stated that CitiBank does not offer Pay Off Letters and that I should print out my statement 2 weeks later. As a financial institution, you should understand that Time is of the Essence when it comes to the home mortgage loan approval process. I was able to obtain Pay Off Letters with absolutely zero difficulty or hesitation from Wells Fargo, Discover, and ACS Student Loans. Once I stated this fact to the representative, she consulted with someone who then said I would be receiving a Pay Off Letter shortly.

The call experience was only mildly unpleasant. I was only compelled to write this letter due to the fact that this is the "Pay Off Letter" that I received:  "Dear ALVINA Y ANDRZEJEWSKI: We're confirming that during the past 12 months, your account has been current and not in default under the terms of the Card Agreement."

If you are reading this complaint letter... I hope that you can tell the difference between what I REQUESTED and what I RECEIVED. So, here is my response.

Dear CitiBank: You failed. Thanks for nothing. I officially despise your financial institution for your ineptitude and complete disregard of my needs. I will make sure to tell everyone my experience. Even though that will hardly make a difference, it will still give me greater satisfaction than dealing with your customer service department.

As you might have guessed... I did not receive a response.  Oh well, it doesn't even matter because we totally got our loan approved anyway. *woot woot*  It's not completely finalized yet because the builders just applied for a City Permit to build the home - it's a dirt lot right now.  After the builder gets the nod from the City, then construction will begin and then I think 30 days out we can lock the rate and everything.

We should be able to get the keys to our new beautiful home in the Northwest mountains area of Las Vegas in late June/July.  The neighborhood is called Providence (http://www.providencelv.com).  It's a really nice master planned community with parks & playgrounds, a promenade, trails, big/small dog parks, and an elementary school.  We visited just about every single home builder in the entire Las Vegas basin and looked specifically at 4 neighborhood areas.  I literally felt like Goldilocks... this one's too big, this one's too small, this one's too expensive... too shabby, too many rooms, too few rooms, too confusing layout, too many hallways, too many random closets (ya, that happens here), too far off the freeway, too close to the busy road, etc.  After a lot of extremely careful consideration, we chose this one because of several factors.

Firstly, the geographical location of this neighborhood sits at a much higher elevation than the rest of Las Vegas (really, you go some small stony peaks to get there) so it is actually about 10 degrees cooler there in the summertime compared to the temperature on the Strip.  It's 25 minutes away from the Strip - we did the actual drive to the Caesar's Palace parking structure.  Next, it really was the only floor plan that caught our eye and we could see ourselves living in.  It's 2 stories with 4 bedrooms... more than enough space for us to ever grow into but we added a loft option because it was just a better usage of space - and that brought the total square footage to approximately 2300 sq.ft.  To quote the most annoying book that I began reading as an obligation and now I've ordered the next two in the series... palatial.  (ugh! buy a thesaurus!)  Also, it had a bigger lot size than most of the other models we've seen - which is important because we want an adequately sized driveway AND an adequately sized backyard.  Lastly, it was the most bang for our buck in terms of the features and upgrades that come inside the home.  For instance, the Gourmet Kitchen package is standard... so I'm going to have double wall ovens!!  *Eeeeeeeee*

So, the excitement is certainly beginning but there's still a few months ahead of us before we can move in.  In the meantime, Will and I are leasing a 2-bedroom apartment for four months.  We're going to live at the Camden Fairways apartments... and honestly, it's fancy!  OMG, even the apartments are spacious and impressive out here.  It's over 1000+ sq.ft... that's like unheard of in San Diego without breaking the bank!  So, this will be our luxurious temporary home until we move into our super awesome dream home.  And the best part is that this apartment complex allows up to 2 dogs per unit... so my babies will be coming in 2 weeks!  YAY!!