UPDATE!!!!!!

Okay, finally, an update. I have to do this in 10 minutes so let's see how fast I can type.

It's been getting really hard to find time to blog since they are actually making me work at work these days, and I've been swamped getting this short film going while writing sketches for a sketch comedy show next month.

We all went to Vegas for the 4th weekend last weekend and Reggie had us hooked up by getting us on the list at Pure and his friend's club Tangerine. We drove out on Saturday morning leaving at 5am. It was surprisingly not as painful as I thought it would be. We hit up the 3 Card Poker table at Treasure Island as soon as we got there, and despite the fact Reggie had been practicing 3 Card and was so excited, in his very first time ever playing the game, he lost $100 within 10 minutes. Fuck. I won almost $100 so it wasn't so bad but he ended up sitting out most of the day because he had zero cash on him and a whole weekend left to go.

We met up with Amol, Annie, AD and Tyler at the Imperial Palace and split up to play other things. I've never been inside the IP because it's one of the lower end casinoes on the strip, but what they had that was a trip was the Legends Pit where the dealers are all impersonators. Dolly Parton was awesome and "busted" enough for us to win a little. Jake the Blues Brother was a dick so we got up and left, though we came back when Ricky Martin and his huge nipples performed La Vida Loca. The sad thing was that I had left my camera in the car so I can't show you guys these people. Ricky Martin had this see-through flamboyant red shirt that did little to hide his perky nipples. As Kate, the Hot Librarian said, "It's like this casino is an accessory for those nipples." The Rod Stewart impersonator was annoying as hell and freaky looking. He looked like a man trying to look like a drag queen trying to look like Rod Stewart. Tyler noted, "But isn't that Rod Stewart?" Very good point.

After gambling all day, we headed out for pho for dinner, then to Pure in Caesar's. I had heard from my coworker that Pure was one of the best dance clubs he'd ever been to, so we were psyched to get on the list, especially when we got there an hour before it opened to see a line of over 100 people already standing outside. The place was awesome, housing the famous Pussycat Dolls on the first floor. Upstairs was an outdoor lounge with an amazing view of the strip. The music was hip hop and decent, and the drinks were strong.

I wanted to see Reggie's "game" so I told him to hit on someone so I could see his game. We agreed that we would each hit on someone, though his end goal was to dance with someone while mine was to get someone's phone number. So he walked around looking for a girl while I followed him discretely. He chatted up this Asian girl and her friend and came back and said they said they would dance later. He said it was my turn and even though I didn't fully think he achieved his goal. I looked around for someone but to be honest, there wasn't really anyone interesting. I walked around for a bit until some Asian guy grabbed me and was giving me game. So I just chatted him up long enough to get to the numbers stage, telling him, "Hey, I've gotta find my friends but maybe we could all hang out later." He tried to get my number but I didn't want to give it out, so I just said I'd find him later.

We danced for a bit and walked around, though those two Asian girls kept stopping Reggie and talking to him. I would bolt whenever they did that so he could look single. I ended up bumping into my cousin Parkson who was there with some friends. I think he was afraid I'd get in the way of his game or something, because he disappeared soon after.

We headed to Tangerine after Pure where Reggie had gotten us table service. We lost half the group--only Reg, Sareet, Kate, AD and I left. We were the real troopers. Reggie's friend Cooper hooked us up with a table in the VIP section with a bottle of Grey Goose, which was all it took to get Kate and Sareet dancing on a platform. Near the end of the night, we were ready to leave but AD convinced us to leave him there so he could try to get with this trashy looking girl with huge breasts. "I'm not a stripper, I'm a DANCER," he quoted/declared, but I'm sure we would have both understood the context in which that statement makes sense if we hadn't both been blasted.

The group woke up just before 10am the next day...I think most of us were still drunk.

The second day was interesting. 4 hours at the Bellagio buffet (2 1/2 hours spent in the line). We went back to the hotel and then I wanted to stop by the drugstore down the street to pick up flipflops before we headed over to meet the rest of the group at the Fremont Experience. While leaving the drugstore, this old black lady asks us for a ride to her hotel which was just up the street. It was probably only a 5-10 minute walk, but it was 110 degrees outside so it would have been a miserable walk. We had 5 people all together so we didn't have room for her, but it didn't feel right not to take her when it was so close. So we discussed it outside. Tyler voted not to take her. Kate threw in that it would be good karma to take her. We ended up leaving Kate, Sarita and Tyler at the store while we dropped her off. The only thing I was worried about was if it was a hustle and she was leading us into some dark alley to get robbed, so I asked her first, "Do you have any guns?" She laughed and it sounded sincere so we gave her a ride.

It turned out she was staying in the same hotel as us, in the room right below ours. She tried to give us $5 for taking her but we wouldn't take it. I told her just to tell her friends back home in Michigan (yay!) that California people are really nice. We went back and picked up the grew, then headed out to old town Vegas.

We sat down at a $5 minimum 3 Card table and once again, Reggie was down. I hit 2 straights within 8 hands (odds are 6 to 1) so I was doing really well. Reggie went down $60 so he sat out. He decided to jump back in for one hand, and his timely entry led to me being dealt a straight flush, odds 40-1. Being $335 up, I left the table. Reggie had $30 and wanted to play craps. I decided to play the $35, figuring that if I lost it, I'd still be up $300. We rode some hot shooters, and then Reggie went crazy, shooting for over half an hour. He ended up turning $30 into $150 with me up about the same, so we decided to leave while we were up.

It wasn't until we got home later that night that we realized...maybe it really was good karma at work. Because Tyler, who had been the only one who didn't want to give the old lady a ride, had been up $240 dollars the day before, ended up losing it at the casino.

We went to dinner at the Star Trek Experience in the Hilton to celebrate Amol's birthday, then headed back to Tangerine that night for more table service and to meet up with Alex and Sarah. It was Sarah's birthday weekend so she was there with a group of girls, making Alex the big pimp. The night ended with a dance off between Alex and Reggie, where Alex made all us Asians proud because the boy can move like he's black.

We left at 8am the next day. It was a crazy fun trip. But the crazy thing was what happened after we got back. We got in around 2pm, and had to be at Reggie's manager's house for a 4th of July bbq at 4. So we took a short nap then headed to the Valley for the bbq, only to show up to find it had been moved to the day before but no one had told us. So we chat with her family for a while then leave, only to find that we must have run over a nail on the way over because the tire is flat. So it takes us an hour to change the tire because the jack is broken and we have to borrow one from a neighbor. Keep in mind, neither of us have eaten since 8am that morning (McDonald's) and it's 5pm so we're starving. Sometime while we're changing the tire, I start getting really nauseous but I attribute it to having not eaten in a while.

We finally get the tire fixed and hurry to grab dinner. We decide on Souplantation because I'm actually feeling sicker than I want to admit, and soup is the only thing I can think of being able to put in me. We show up and I have some chicken noodle soup but it wasn't doing anything. I end up rushing home and spending the rest of the night and most of the next day throwing up everything I try to put in me. Must have been food poisoning from McDonald's that morning.

It was weird how all these bad things happened after we got home, but I keep thinking of it like this--thank God our tire didn't blow out or get flat between here and Vegas. Also, if the bbq had been on, we would have been there until the sun set and could have had to change the tire in the dark, so we're lucky we didn't have to do that. And lastly, it would have been horrible if I had started getting sick on the long drive home from Vegas, but luckily, it didn't kick in until I was home. So overall, I'm really thankful.

So without further ado, some photos (click them to enlarge):