What I Left in Las Vegas

The Vegas Scrabble tournament was great fun!  We played 21 games in the main tournament (there were also two Early Bird and two Late Bird tournaments before and after the main event).  Of the 21 games, I won 12 and lost 9 and was not too disappointed in the outcome.  I think I went up a few rating points in the final standings, but they have not yet been posted.

Opponents I played were from all over the map in North America:

What I left in Las Vegas:

• my EXLIM camera with all the tournament pictures
• all the pictures from the various hotels with gorgeous decorations celebrating the Chinese New Year of the Snake
• money at the Black Jack tables
• discarded house slippers

I was glad to leave the slippers, not happy to leave the dollars.  What will be returned is the camera and pictures.  The camera was turned in after the last Scrabble game and the director of the tournament will graciously mail it back to me.  So stayed tuned for some graphics from Las Vegas!

Since I had driven to Las Vegas from Grand Junction, CO, the car was available to transport friends from the Riviera Casino and Hotel to various local restaurants.  The Riviera did NOT supply tasty food at any of their five restaurants, so that is why Lee, Glenda, Regenia and I went out for evening dinners.

And by the bye, Lee and Glenda both placed in the top three in severals tournaments.  Glenda won one of the early birds! She wisely did not spend her earnings at the casino.  Lee and Glenda and I have known one another for well over ten years, and Regenia is a new friend from Arlington, TX. We had fun together in our off-play hours, or at least I had fun with them!

Post Script:
The Riviera is one of the older hotels, and one that a person does not necessarily brag about staying there.  (In fact, you could say it was the crummiest hotel/casino on the strip.) The last day we were there, Regenia and I walked over to the new Wynn Hotel for a late lunch. We enjoyed our little outing and were ready to walk back to our "shabby" hotel but got lost in the vastness of the grounds.  Regenia asked a bellman which direction to take to find the way back.  He asked where we were staying, and both she and I were vague about our hotel, just saying we were headed north.  I thought it was kind of funny that neither of us wanted the bellman at the ritzy Wynn to know where we had laid our heads for five nights.  We were hotel snobs!  And the bellman could have cared less where we actually stayed; he was just trying to be helpful with his directions.